We propose a scheme for the generation of counterpropagating polarization-entangled photon pairs from a dual-periodically poled crystal. Compared with the usual forward-wave type source, this source, in the backward-wave way, has a much narrower band
width. With a 2-cm-long bulk crystal, the bandwidths of the example sources are estimated to be 3.6 GHz, and the spectral brightnesses are more than 100 pairs/(s GHz mW). Two concurrent quasi-phase-matched spontaneous parametric down-conversion processes in a single crystal enable our source to be compact and stable. This scheme does not rely on any state projection and applies to both degenerate and non-degenerate cases, facilitating applications of the entangled photons.
We consider the decoherence of photons suffering in phase-damping channels. By exploring the evolutions of single-photon polarization states and two-photon polarization-entangled states, we find that different frequency spectrum envelopes of photons
induce different decoherence processes. A white frequency spectrum can lead the decoherence to an ideal Markovian process. Some color frequency spectrums can induce asymptotical decoherence, while, some other color frequency spectrums can make coherence vanish periodically with variable revival amplitudes. These behaviors result from the non-Markovian effects on the decoherence process, which may give rise to a revival of coherence after complete decoherence.
We propose a re-encoder to generate a refreshed parity encoded state from an existing parity encoded state. This is the simplest case of the scheme by Gilchrist et al. (Phys. Rev. A 75, 052328). We show that it is possible to demonstrate with existin
g technology parity encoded quantum gates and teleportation.
