We propose a novel scheme to generate polarization entanglement from spatially-correlated photon pairs. We experimentally realized a scheme by means of a spatial correlation effect in a spontaneous parametric down-conversion and a modified Michelson interferometer. The scheme we propose in this paper can be interpreted as a conversion process from spatial correlation to polarization entanglement.
Spontaneous Parametric Down-Conversion (SPDC), also known as parametric fluorescence, parametric noise, parametric scattering and all various combinations of the abbreviation SPDC, is a non-linear optical process where a photon spontaneously splits i
nto two other photons of lower energies. One would think that this article is about particle physics and yet it is not, as this process can occur fairly easily on a day to day basis in an optics laboratory. Nowadays, SPDC is at the heart of many quantum optics experiments for applications in quantum cryptography, quantum simulation, quantum metrology but also for testing fundamentals laws of physics in quantum mechanics. In this article, we will focus on the physics of this process and highlight few important properties of SPDC. There will be two parts: a first theoretical one showing the particular quantum nature of SPDC and the second part, more experimental and in particular focusing on applications of parametric down-conversion. This is clearly a non-exhaustive article about parametric down-conversion as there is a tremendous literature on the subject, but it gives the necessary first elements needed for a novice student or researcher to work on SPDC sources of light.
Most investigations of multipartite entanglement have been concerned with temporal modes of the electromagnetic field, and have neglected its spatial structure. We present a simple model which allows to generate tripartite entanglement between spatia
l modes by parametric down-conversion with two symmetrically-tilted plane waves serving as a pump. The characteristics of this entanglement are investigated. We also discuss the generalization of our scheme to 2N+1-partite entanglement using 2N symmetrically-tilted plane pump waves. Another interesting feature is the possibility of entanglement localization in just two spatial modes.
Miniaturised entangled photon sources are highly demanded for the development of integrated quantum photonics. Since the invention of subwavelength optical metasurfaces and their successes at replacing bulky optical components, the possibility of imp
lementing entangled photon sources on such devices is actively investigated. Here, as a first step towards the development of quantum optical metasurfaces (QOM), we demonstrate photon pair generation via spontaneous parametric down-conversion (SPDC) from subwavelength films. We achieved photon pair generation with a high coincidence-to-accidental ratio in lithium niobate and gallium phosphide nanofilms. In addition, we have measured the SPDC frequency spectrum via fibre spectroscopy, obtaining photon pairs with a spectral bandwidth of 500;nm, limited only by the overall detection efficiency. Moreover, we have observed the vacuum field enhancement due to a Fabry-Perot resonance inside the nonlinear films. Our experiments lay the groundwork for the future development of flat SPDC sources, including QOM.
We study the quantum properties of the polarization of the light produced in type II spontaneous parametric down-conversion in the framework of a multi-mode model valid in any gain regime. We show that the the microscopic polarization entanglement of
photon pairs survives in the high gain regime (multi-photon regime), in the form of nonclassical correlation of all the Stokes operators describing polarization degrees of freedom.
We present an experimental characterization of the statistics of multiple photon pairs produced by spontaneous parametric down-conversion realized in a nonlinear medium pumped by high-energy ultrashort pulses from a regenerative amplifier. The photon
number resolved measurement has been implemented with the help of a fiber loop detector. We introduce an effective theoretical description of the observed statistics based on parameters that can be assigned direct physical nterpretation. These parameters, determined for our source from the collected experimental data, characterize the usefulness of down-conversion sources in multiphoton interference schemes that underlie protocols for quantum information processing and communication.