No Arabic abstract
Coherent-state-based phase estimation is a fruitful testbed for the field of precision measurements since coherent states are robust to decoherence when compared with exotic quantum states. The seminal work done by Caves (https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevD.23.1693 , Phys. Rev. D 23, 1693 (1981)) stated that the phase sensitivity of a U(2) interferometer fed with a coherent state is limited by the shot-noise limit (SNL). In this Letter, we demonstrate that this bound is not conclusive sensitivity limit and can be broken when the measurement includes an external phase reference. The SNL can be surpassed by a factor of $sqrt{2}$ and the validity is supported through the calculation of quantum Fisher information. Additionally, we discuss other single-mode Gaussian inputs of which sensitivities are beyond the SNL. Our work shows potential applications for many metological scenarios, particularly when the measured samples immersed in great lossy environments or can withstand bright illumination.
Magneto-optical sensors including spin noise spectroscopies and magneto-optical Kerr effect microscopies are now ubiquitous tools for materials characterization that can provide new understanding of spin dynamics, hyperfine interactions, spin-orbit interactions, and charge-carrier g-factors. Both interferometric and intensity-difference measurements can provide photon shot-noise limited sensitivity, but further improvements in sensitivity with classical resources require either increased laser power that can induce unwanted heating and electronic perturbations or increased measurement times that can obscure out-of-equilibrium dynamics and radically slow experimental throughput. Proof-of-principle measurements have already demonstrated quantum enhanced spin noise measurements with a squeezed readout field that are likely to be critical to the non-perturbative characterization of spin excitations in quantum materials that emerge at low temperatures. Here, we propose a truncated nonlinear interferometric readout for low-temperature magneto-optical Kerr effect measurements that is accessible with todays quantum optical resources. We show that 10 $text{nrad}/sqrt{text{Hz}}$ sensitivity is achievable with optical power as small as 1 $mu$W such that a realistic $T$ = 83 mK can be maintained in commercially available dilution refrigerators. The quantum advantage for the proposed measurements persists even in the limit of large loss and small squeezing parameters.
Photonic sensors have many applications in a range of physical settings, from measuring mechanical pressure in manufacturing to detecting protein concentration in biomedical samples. A variety of sensing approaches exist, and plasmonic systems in particular have received much attention due to their ability to confine light below the diffraction limit, greatly enhancing sensitivity. Recently, quantum techniques have been identified that can outperform classical sensing methods and achieve sensitivity below the so-called shot-noise limit. Despite this significant potential, the use of definite photon number states in lossy plasmonic systems for further improving sensing capabilities is not well studied. Here, we investigate the sensing performance of a plasmonic interferometer that simultaneously exploits the quantum nature of light and its electromagnetic field confinement. We show that, despite the presence of loss, specialised quantum resources can provide improved sensitivity and resolution beyond the shot-noise limit within a compact plasmonic device operating below the diffraction limit.
The displacement of micro-electro-mechanical-systems (MEMS) cantilevers is used to measure a broad variety of phenomena in devices ranging from force microscopes to biochemical sensors to thermal imaging systems. We demonstrate the first direct measurement of a MEMS cantilever displacement with a noise floor at 40% of the shot noise limit (SNL). By combining multi-spatial-mode quantum light sources with a simple differential measurement, we show that sub-SNL MEMS displacement sensitivity is highly accessible compared to previous efforts that measured the displacement of macroscopic mirrors with very distinct spatial structures crafted with multiple optical parametric amplifiers and locking loops. These results support a new class of quantum MEMS sensor with an ultimate signal to noise ratio determined by quantum correlations, enabling ultra-trace sensing, imaging, and microscopy applications in which signals were previously obscured by shot noise.
Semiclassical methods can now explain many mesoscopic effects (shot-noise, conductance fluctuations, etc) in clean chaotic systems, such as chaotic quantum dots. In the deep classical limit (wavelength much less than system size) the Ehrenfest time (the time for a wavepacket to spread to a classical size) plays a crucial role, and random matrix theory (RMT) ceases to apply to the transport properties of open chaotic systems. Here we summarize some of our recent results for shot-noise (intrinsically quantum noise in the current through the system) in this deep classical limit. For systems with perfect coupling to the leads, we use a phase-space basis on the leads to show that the transmission eigenvalues are all 0 or 1 -- so transmission is noiseless [Whitney-Jacquod, Phys. Rev. Lett. 94, 116801 (2005), Jacquod-Whitney, Phys. Rev. B 73, 195115 (2006)]. For systems with tunnel-barriers on the leads we use trajectory-based semiclassics to extract universal (but non-RMT) shot-noise results for the classical regime [Whitney, Phys. Rev. B 75, 235404 (2007)].
A recent claim by Lieu et al that beam splitter intensity subtraction (or homodyne with one vacuum port) followed by high resolution sampling can lead to detection of brightness of thermal light at the shot noise limit is reexamined here. We confirm the calculation of Zmuidzinas that the claim of Lieu et al was falsified by an incorrect assumption about the correlations in thermal noise.