Photonics, Volume 3, Issue 4 (December 2016) – 14 articles

In the first section of this Chapter, the basics of nonlinear optical (NLO) processes are systematically described. Then the generation of the visible pulse utilizing the NLO processes is described and ultrafast spectroscopy using the visible pulse is discussed. By using such short pulse, fast chemical reactions, which cannot be identified by utilizing strobe light or flash lamp, can be studied. After the development of femtosecond lasers, they have been widely applied to observe the transition state of various chemical reactions. In the near infrared (NIR) region, a commercial light source of Ti:sapphire laser is available as a femtosecond light source, but not available in the visible and ultraviolet (UV) regions. In this article, we report our development of sub 10 fs visible-NIR, UV, and deep-ultraviolet (DUV) pulses and their applications to ultrafast spectroscopy. Full article

Numerical pump-probe simulations for the sub-cycle transient spectroscopy of thin film diamond under intense few cycle pulse laser field is reported. The electron dynamics is calculated by the time-dependent Kohn-Sham equation. Simultaneously, the propagation of electromagnetic field is calculated by the Maxwell equation. Our result shows that the modulation of the reflectivity, transmission, and absorption around the optical gap do not coincide with the field amplitude of the pump laser. The phase shift of the modulation with respect to the pump field depends on the pump intensity and probe frequency. The modulation of the reflectivity is sensitive to the choice of the exchange-correlation potential, and dynamical effect of the mean-field in meta-GGA potential. Full article

We introduce and analyze theoretically a procedure that combines slow adiabatic stimulated Raman adiabatic passage (STIRAP) manipulation with short nonadiabatic Rabi pulses to produce any desired three-level state in a qutrit system. In this protocol, the fast pulses create superpositions between the ground state and the first excited state, while the slow pulses transfer an arbitrary population to the second excited state via STIRAP. We demonstrate high-fidelity quantum control of the level populations and phases and we characterize the errors incurred under the breakdown of adiabaticity. In a configuration where an ancillary state is available, we show how to realize a nondemolition monitoring of the relative phases. These methods are general and can be implemented on any experimental platform where a quantum system with at least three accessible energy levels is available. We discuss here in detail experimental implementations in circuit quantum electrodynamics (QED) based on the results obtained with a transmon, where the control of population using the hybrid Rabi-STIRAP sequence has been achieved. Full article

An approximation-free and fully quantum optic formalism for parametric processes is presented. Phase-dependent gain coefficients and related phase-pulling effects are identified for quantum Rayleigh emission and the electro-optic conversion of photons providing parametric amplification in small-scale integration of photonic devices. These mechanisms can be manipulated to deliver, simultaneously, sub-Poissonian distributions of photons as well as phase-dependent amplification in the same optical quadrature of a signal field. Full article

We report on a numerical study of optical chirality. Intertwined gold helices illuminated with plane waves concentrate right and left circularly polarized electromagnetic field energy to sub-wavelength regions. These spots of enhanced chirality can be smoothly shifted in position and magnitude by varying illumination parameters, allowing for the control of light-matter interactions on a nanometer scale. Full article

We investigate theoretically the use of an electron in a Penning trap as a detector of single microwave photons. At the University of Sussex we are developing a chip Penning trap technology, designed to be integrated within quantum circuits. Microwave photons are guided into the trap and interact with the electron’s quantum cyclotron motion. This is an electric dipole transition, where the near field of the microwave radiation induces quantum jumps of the cyclotron harmonic oscillator. The quantum jumps can be monitored using the continuous Stern-Gerlach effect, providing the quantum non demolition signal of the microwave quanta. We calculate the quantum efficiency of photon detection and discuss the main features and technical challenges for the trapped electron as a quantum microwave sensor. Full article

We discuss several issues associated with employing a constant matrix element approximation for the coupling of light to multiband electrons in the context of time-resolved angle-resolved photoemission spectroscopy (TR-ARPES). In particular, we demonstrate that the “constant matrix element approximation” —even when reasonable—only holds for specific choices of the one-electron basis, and changing to other bases, requires including nonconstant corrections to the matrix element. We also discuss some simplifying approximations, where a constant matrix element is employed in multiple bases, and the consequences of this further approximation (especially with respect to the calculated TR-ARPES signal becoming negative). We also discuss issues related to gauge invariance of the final spectra. Full article

We propose a realistic scheme of generating a traveling odd Schrödinger cat state and a generalized entangled coherent state in circuit quantum electrodynamics (circuit-QED). A squeezed vacuum state is used as the initial resource of nonclassical states, which can be created through a Josephson traveling-wave parametric amplifier, and travels through a transmission line. Because a single-photon subtraction from the squeezed vacuum gives an odd Schrödinger cat state with very high fidelity, we consider a specific circuit-QED setup consisting of the Josephson amplifier creating the traveling resource in a line, a beam-splitter coupling two transmission lines, and a single photon detector located at the end of the other line. When a single microwave photon is detected by measuring the excited state of a superconducting qubit in the detector, a heralded cat state is generated with high fidelity in the opposite line. For example, we show that the high fidelity of the outcome with the ideal cat state can be achieved with appropriate squeezing parameters theoretically. As its extended setup, we suggest that generalized entangled coherent states can be also built probabilistically and that they are useful for microwave quantum information processing for error-correctable qudits in circuit-QED. Full article

Current instruments used to detect specific protein-protein interactions in live cells for applications in high-content screening (HCS) are limited by the time required to measure the lifetime. Here, a 32 × 1 single-photon avalanche diode (SPAD) array was explored as a detector for fluorescence lifetime imaging (FLIM) in HCS. Device parameters and characterization results were interpreted in the context of the application to determine if the SPAD array could satisfy the requirements of HCS-FLIM. Fluorescence lifetime measurements were performed using a known fluorescence standard; and the recovered fluorescence lifetime matched literature reported values. The design of a theoretical 32 × 32 SPAD array was also considered as a detector for a multi-point confocal scanning microscope. Full article

Junction formation in deep trenches is proposed as a new means of creating a built-in drift field in silicon drift detectors (SDDs). The potential performance of this trenched drift detector (TDD) was investigated analytically and through simulations, and compared to simulations of conventional bulk-silicon drift detector (BSDD) configurations. Although the device was not experimentally realized, the manufacturability of the TDDs is estimated to be good on the basis of previously demonstrated photodiodes and detectors fabricated in PureB technology. The pure boron deposition of this technology allows good trench coverage and is known to provide nm-shallow low-noise p⁺n diodes that can be used as radiation-hard light-entrance windows. With this type of diode, the TDDs would be suitable for X-ray radiation detection down to 100 eV and up to tens of keV energy levels. In the TDD, the drift region is formed by varying the geometry and position of the trenches while the reverse biasing of all diodes is kept at the same constant voltage. For a given wafer doping, the drift field is lower for the TDD than for a BSDD and it demands a much higher voltage between the anode and cathode, but also has several advantages: it eliminates the possibility of punch-through and no current flows from the inner to outer perimeter of the cathode because a voltage divider is not needed to set the drift field. In addition, the loss of sensitive area at the outer perimeter of the cathode is much smaller. For example, the simulations predict that an optimized TDD geometry with an active-region radius of 3100 µm could have a drift field of 370 V/cm and a photo-sensitive radius that is 500-µm larger than that of a comparable BSDD structure. The PureB diodes on the front and back of the TDD are continuous, which means low dark currents and high stability with respect to leakage currents that otherwise could be caused by radiation damage. The dark current of the 3100-µm TDD will increase by only 34% if an interface trap concentration of 10¹² cm⁻² is introduced to approximate the oxide interface degradation that could be caused during irradiation. The TDD structure is particularly well-suited for implementation in multi-cell drift detector arrays where it is shown to significantly decrease the cross-talk between segments. The trenches will, however, also present a narrow dead area that can split the energy deposited by high-energy photons traversing this dead area. The count rate within a cell of a radius = 300 µm in a multi-cell TDD array is found to be as high as 10 Mcps. Full article

Quantum photonic integrated circuits (QPICs) on a GaAs platform allow the generation, manipulation, routing, and detection of non-classical states of light, which could pave the way for quantum information processing based on photons. In this article, the prototype of a multi-functional QPIC is presented together with our recent achievements in terms of nanofabrication and integration of each component of the circuit. Photons are generated by excited InAs quantum dots (QDs) and routed through ridge waveguides towards photonic crystal cavities acting as filters. The filters with a transmission of 20% and free spectral range ≥66 nm are able to select a single excitonic line out of the complex emission spectra of the QDs. The QD luminescence can be measured by on-chip superconducting single photon detectors made of niobium nitride (NbN) nanowires patterned on top of a suspended nanobeam, reaching a device quantum efficiency up to 28%. Moreover, two electrically independent detectors are integrated on top of the same nanobeam, resulting in a very compact autocorrelator for on-chip g⁽²⁾(τ) measurements. Full article

A new scheme of radio-over-fiber (RoF) network based on spectral-amplitude-coding (SAC) optical code division multiple access (OCDMA) is herein proposed. Differential service is provided by a power control scheme that classifies users into several classes and assigns each of them with a specific power level. Additionally, the wavelength reuse technique is adapted to support bidirectional transmission and reduce base station (BS) cost. Both simulation and numerical results show that significantly differential quality-of-service (QoS) in bit-error rate (BER) is achieved in both downlink and uplink transmissions. Full article

Cavity optomechanical systems with an enhanced coupling between mechanical motion and electromagnetic radiation have permitted the investigation of many novel physical effects. The optomechanical coupling in the majority of these systems is of dispersive nature: the cavity resonance frequency is modulated by the vibrations of the mechanical oscillator. Dissipative optomechanical interaction, where the photon lifetime in the cavity is modulated by the mechanical motion, has recently attracted considerable interest and opens new avenues in optomechanical control and sensing. In this work we demonstrate an external optical control over the dissipative optomechanical coupling strength mediated by the modulation of the absorption of a quantum dot layer in a hybrid optomechanical system. Such control enhances the capability of tailoring the optomechanical coupling of our platform, which can be used in complement to the previously demonstrated control of the relative (dispersive to dissipative) coupling strength via the geometry of the integrated access waveguide. Full article

Using coherent optical detection and digital signal processing, laser phase noise and equalization enhanced phase noise can be effectively mitigated using the feed-forward and feed-back carrier phase recovery approaches. In this paper, theoretical analyses of feed-back and feed-forward carrier phase recovery methods have been carried out in the long-haul high-speed n-level phase shift keying (n-PSK) optical fiber communication systems, involving a one-tap normalized least-mean-square (LMS) algorithm, a block-wise average algorithm, and a Viterbi-Viterbi algorithm. The analytical expressions for evaluating the estimated carrier phase and for predicting the bit-error-rate (BER) performance (such as the BER floors) have been presented and discussed in the n-PSK coherent optical transmission systems by considering both the laser phase noise and the equalization enhanced phase noise. The results indicate that the Viterbi-Viterbi carrier phase recovery algorithm outperforms the one-tap normalized LMS and the block-wise average algorithms for small phase noise variance (or effective phase noise variance), while the one-tap normalized LMS algorithm shows a better performance than the other two algorithms for large phase noise variance (or effective phase noise variance). In addition, the one-tap normalized LMS algorithm is more sensitive to the level of modulation formats. Full article