Room-temperature single-photon source with near-millisecond built-in memory

Abstract

Non-classical photon sources are a crucial resource for distributed quantum networks. Photons generated from matter systems with memory capability are particularly promising, as they can be integrated into a network where each source is used on-demand. Among all kinds of solid state and atomic quantum memories, room-temperature atomic vapours are especially attractive due to their robustness and potential scalability. To-date room-temperature photon sources have been limited either in their memory time or the purity of the photonic state. Here we demonstrate a single-photon source based on room-temperature memory. Following heralded loading of the memory, a single photon is retrieved from it after a variable storage time. The single-photon character of the retrieved field is validated by the strong suppression of the two-photon component with antibunching as low as \\documentclass[12pt]{minimal} \\usepackage{amsmath} \\usepackage{wasysym} \\usepackage{amsfonts} \\usepackage{amssymb} \\usepackage{amsbsy} \\usepackage{mathrsfs} \\usepackage{upgreek} \\setlength{\\oddsidemargin}{-69pt} \\begin{document}$${g}_{{\\rm{RR| W = 1}}}^{(2)}=0.20\\pm 0.07$$\\end{document}gRR∣W=1(2)=0.20±0.07. Non-classical correlations between the heralding and the retrieved photons are maintained for up to \\documentclass[12pt]{minimal} \\usepackage{amsmath} \\usepackage{wasysym} \\usepackage{amsfonts} \\usepackage{amssymb} \\usepackage{amsbsy} \\usepackage{mathrsfs} \\usepackage{upgreek} \\setlength{\\oddsidemargin}{-69pt} \\begin{document}$${\\tau }_{{\\rm{NC}}}^{{\\mathcal{R}}}=(0.68\\pm 0.08)\\ {\\rm{ms}}$$\\end{document}τNCR=(0.68±0.08)ms, more than two orders of magnitude longer than previously demonstrated with other room-temperature systems. Correlations sufficient for violating Bell inequalities exist for up to τBI\u2009=\u2009(0.15\u2009±\u20090.03)\u2009ms.