We propose a single optical photon source for quantum cryptography based on the acousto-electric effect. Surface acoustic waves (SAWs) propagating through a quasi-one-dimensional channel have been shown to produce packets of electrons which reside in the SAW minima and travel at the velocity of sound. In our scheme these electron packets are injected into a p-type region, resulting in photon emission. Since the number of electrons in each packet can be controlled down to a single electron, a stream of single (or N) photon states, with a creation time strongly correlated with the driving acoustic field, should be generated.
We propose theory for reversible quantum transducer connecting superconducting qubits and optical photons using acoustic waves in piezoelectrics. The proposed device consists of integrated acousto-optic resonator that utilizes stimulated Brillouin scattering for phonon-photon conversion, and piezoelectric effect for coupling of phonons to qubits. We evaluate the phonon-photon coupling rate, and show that the required power of optical pump as well as the other device parameters providing full and faithful quantum conversion are feasible for implementation with the state of the art integrated ac…
We analyze the coupling of atoms or atom-like emitters to nanophotonic waveguides in the presence of propagating acoustic waves. Specifically, we show that strong index modulations induced by such waves can drastically modify the effective photonic density of states and thereby influence the strength, the directionality, as well as the overall characteristics of photon emission and absorption processes. These effects enable a complete dynamical control of light-matter interactions in waveguide structures, which even in a two dimensional system can be used to efficiently exchange individual pho…
This article reviews the main theoretical and experimental advances regarding the interaction between surface acoustic waves (SAWs) and electronic excitations in graphene. The coupling of the graphene electron gas to the SAW piezoelectric field can modify the propagation properties of the SAW, and even amplify the intensity of SAWs traveling along the graphene layer. Conversely, the periodic electric and strain fields of the SAW can be used to modify the graphene Dirac cone and to couple light into graphene plasmons. Finally, SAWs can generate acousto-electric currents in graphene. These incre…
Light-sound interactions have long been exploited in various acousto-optic devices based on bulk crystalline materials. Conventionally these devices operate in megahertz frequency range where the acoustic wavelength is much longer than the optical wavelength and a long interaction length is required to attain significant coupling. With nanoscale transducers, acoustic waves with sub-optical wavelengths can now be excited to induce strong acousto-optic coupling in nanophotonic devices. Here we demonstrate microwave frequency surface acoustic wave transducers co-integrated with nanophotonic reson…
We experimentally study a circuit quantum acoustodynamics system, which consists of a superconducting artificial atom, coupled to both a two-dimensional surface acoustic wave resonator and a one-dimensional microwave transmission line. The strong coupling between the artificial atom and the acoustic wave resonator is confirmed by the observation of the vacuum Rabi splitting at the base temperature of dilution refrigerator. We show that the propagation of microwave photons in the microwave transmission line can be controlled by a few phonons in the acoustic wave resonator. Furthermore, we demon…
Solid-state quantum acoustodynamic (QAD) systems provide a compact platform for quantum information storage and processing by coupling acoustic phonon sources with superconducting or spin qubits. The multi-mode composite high-overtone bulk acoustic wave resonator (HBAR) is a popular phonon source well suited for QAD. However, scattering from defects, grain boundaries, and interfacial/surface roughness in the composite transducer severely limits the phonon relaxation time in sputter-deposited devices. Here, we grow an epitaxial-HBAR, consisting of a metallic NbN bottom electrode and a piezoelec…
A paradigm for universal quantum information processing with integrated acousto-optic frequency beamsplitters
Purdue University（普渡大学）；Oak Ridge National Laboratory（橡树岭国家实验室）；Northern Arizona University（北亚利桑那大学）；Sandia National Laboratories（桑迪亚国家实验室）；Qunnect Inc.（Qunnect公司）
The electro-optic, acousto-optic and nonlinear properties of lithium niobate make it a highly versatile material platform for integrated quantum photonic circuits. A prerequisite for quantum technology applications is the ability to efficiently integrate single photon sources, and to guide the generated photons through ad-hoc circuits. Here we report the integration of quantum dots in monolayer WSe2 into a Ti in-diffused lithium niobate directional coupler. We investigate the coupling of individual quantum dots to the waveguide mode, their spatial overlap, and the overall efficiency of the hyb…
We propose and experimentally demonstrate a device for generating light with arbitrary classical photon-number distribution. We use programmable acousto-optical modulation to control the intensity of light within the dynamic range of more than 30 dB and inter-level transitions faster than 500 ns. We propose a universal method that allows high-fidelity generation of user-defined photon statistics. Extremely high precision <0.001 can be reached for lower photon numbers, and faithful tail behavior can be reached for very high photon numbers. We demonstrate arbitrary statistics generation for up t…
We demonstrate generation of a pulsed stream of electrically triggered single photons in resonance fluorescence, by applying high frequency electrical pulses to a single quantum dot in a p-i-n diode under resonant laser excitation. Single photon emission was verifed, with the probability of multiple photon emission reduced to 2.8%. We show that despite the presence of charge noise in the emission spectrum of the dot, resonant excitation acts as a filter to generate narrow bandwidth photons.
Future quantum networks in which superconducting quantum processors are connected via optical links, will require microwave-to-optical photon converters that preserve entanglement. A doubly-resonant electro-optic modulator (EOM) is a promising platform to realize this conversion. Here, we present our progress towards building such a modulator by demonstrating the optically-resonant half of the device. We demonstrate high quality factor ring, disk and photonic crystal resonators using a hybrid silicon-on-lithium-niobate material system. Optical quality factors up to 730,000 are achieved, corres…
The scalability of quantum dot based non-classical light sources relies on the control over their dissimilar emission energies. Electric fields offer a promising route to tune the quantum dot emission energy through the quantum-confined Stark effect. However, electric fields have been mostly used for tuning the energy of single-photon emission from quantum dots, while electrical control over the energy of entangled-photon emission, which is crucial for building a solid-state quantum repeater using indistinguishable entangled photons, has not been realized yet. Here, we present a method to achi…
Interference between different photons occurs and has been observed under diverse experimental conditions. A necessary condition in order to obtain interference fringes is the existence of at least two possible paths and unknown which-path information. If the photon beams have different frequencies, stability of the sources and fast enough detectors are also required.First order interference between two truly independent CW laser sources is observed. Contrary to what is expected, interference is observed although the photon beams are distinguishable and the path is unequivocally known for each…
Synthetic dimensions provide a promising platform for photonic quantum simulations. Manipulating the flow of photons in these dimensions requires an electric field. However, photons do not have charge and do not directly interact with electric fields. Therefore, alternative approaches are needed to realize electric fields in photonics. One approach is to use engineered gauge fields that can mimic the effect of electric fields and produce the same dynamical behavior. Here, we demonstrate such an electric field for photons propagating in a two-dimensional synthetic space. We achieve this using a…
