Barak Dayan

Observation of strong coupling between one atom and a monolithic microresonator

Over the past decade, strong interactions of light and matter at the single-photon level have enabled a wide set of scientific advances in quantum optics and quantum information science. This work has been performed principally within the setting of cavity quantum electrodynamics with diverse physical systems, including single atoms in Fabry–Perot resonators, quantum dots coupled to micropillars and photonic bandgap cavities and Cooper pairs interacting with superconducting resonators. Experiments with single, localized atoms have been at the forefront of these advances with the use of optical resonators in high-finesse Fabry–Perot configurations. As a result of the extreme technical challenges involved in further improving the multilayer dielectric mirror coatings of these resonators and in scaling to large numbers of devices, there has been increased interest in the development of alternative microcavity systems. Here we show strong coupling between individual caesium atoms and the fields of a high-quality toroidal microresonator. From observations of transit events for single atoms falling through the resonators evanescent field, we determine the coherent coupling rate for interactions near the surface of the resonator. We develop a theoretical model to quantify our observations, demonstrating that strong coupling is achieved, with the rate of coherent coupling exceeding the dissipative rates of the atom and the cavity. Our work opens the way for investigations of optical processes with single atoms and photons in lithographically fabricated microresonators. Applications include the implementation of quantum networks, scalable quantum logic with photons, and quantum information processing on atom chips.

Transform-Limited Pulses Are Not Optimal for Resonant Multiphoton Transitions

Maximizing nonlinear light-matter interactions is a primary motive for compressing laser pulses to achieve ultrashort transform limited pulses. Here we show how, by appropriately shaping the pulses, resonant multiphoton transitions can be enhanced significantly beyond the level achieved by maximizing the pulses peak intensity. We demonstrate the counterintuitive nature of this effect with an experiment in a resonant two-photon absorption, in which, by selectively removing certain spectral bands, the peak intensity of the pulse is reduced by a factor of 40, yet the absorption rate is doubled. Furthermore, by suitably designing the spectral phase of the pulse, we increase the absorption rate by a factor of 7.

Efficient routing of single photons by one atom and a microtoroidal cavity

We demonstrate robust and efficient routing of single photons using a microtoroidal cavity QED system. Single photons from a coherent input are sorted to one output of the fiber with excess photons redirected to the other.

Two Photon Absorption and Coherent Control with Broadband Down-Converted Light

We experimentally demonstrate two-photon absorption with broadband down-converted light (squeezed vacuum). Although incoherent and exhibiting the statistics of a thermal noise, broadband down-converted light can induce two-photon absorption with the same sharp temporal behavior as femtosecond pulses, while exhibiting the high spectral resolution of the narrow band pump laser. Using pulse-shaping methods, we coherently control two-photon absorption in rubidium, demonstrating spectral and temporal resolutions that are 3-5 orders of magnitude below the actual bandwidth and temporal duration of the light itself. Such properties can be exploited in various applications such as spread-spectrum optical communications, tomography, and nonlinear microscopy.

Temporal shaping of entangled photons

We experimentally demonstrate shaping of the two-photon wave function of entangled-photon pairs, utilizing coherent pulse-shaping techniques. By performing spectral-phase manipulations we tailor the second-order correlation function of the photons exactly like a coherent ultrashort pulse. To observe the shaping we perform sum-frequency generation with an ultrahigh flux of entangled photons. At the appropriate conditions, sum-frequency generation performs as a coincidence detector with an ultrashort response time (approximately 100 fs), enabling a direct observation of the two-photon wave function. This property also enables us to demonstrate background-free, high-visibility two-photon interference oscillations.

Nonlinear interactions with an ultrahigh flux of broadband entangled photons.

We experimentally demonstrate sum-frequency generation with entangled photon pairs, generating as many as 40,000 photons per second, visible even to the naked eye. The nonclassical nature of the interaction is exhibited by a linear intensity dependence of the nonlinear process. The key element in our scheme is the generation of an ultrahigh flux of entangled photons while maintaining their nonclassical properties. This is made possible by generating the down-converted photons as broadband as possible, orders of magnitude wider than the pump. This approach can be applied to other nonlinear interactions, and may become useful for various quantum-measurement tasks.

Weak-values technique for velocity measurements

In a recent Letter, Brunner and Simon proposed an interferometric scheme using imaginary weak values with a frequency-domain analysis to outperform standard interferometry in longitudinal phase shifts [Phys. Rev. Lett105, 010405 (2010)]. Here we demonstrate an interferometric scheme combined with a time-domain analysis to measure longitudinal velocities. The technique employs the near-destructive interference of non-Fourier limited pulses, one Doppler shifted due to a moving mirror in a Michelson interferometer. We achieve a velocity measurement of 400 fm/s and show our estimator to be efficient by reaching its Cramér-Rao bound.

Extraction of a single photon from an optical pulse

A single photon is deterministically extracted from a light pulse due to the interaction of the pulse with a single 87Rb atom coupled to a nanofibre-coupled microresonator. The extraction mechanism is insensitive to pulse shape and timing. Removing a single photon from a pulse is one of the most elementary operations that can be performed on light, having both fundamental significance1,2 and practical applications in quantum communication3,4,5,6,7,8,9 and computation10. So far, photon subtraction, in which the removed photon is detected and therefore irreversibly lost, has been implemented in a probabilistic manner with inherently low success rates using low-reflectivity beam splitters1. Here we demonstrate a scheme for the deterministic extraction of a single photon from an incoming pulse. The removed photon is diverted to a different mode, enabling its use for other purposes, such as a photon number-splitting attack on quantum key distribution protocols11. Our implementation makes use of single-photon Raman interaction (SPRINT)12,13 with a single atom near a nanofibre-coupled microresonator. The single-photon extraction probability in our current realization is limited mostly by linear loss, yet probabilities close to unity should be attainable with realistic experimental parameters13.

Optical code-division multiple access using broad-band parametrically generated light

A novel approach for an optical direct-sequence spread spectrum is presented. It is based on the complementary processes of broad-band parametric down-conversion and up-conversion. With parametric down-conversion, a narrow-band continuous-wave (CW) optical field is transformed into two CW broad-band white-noise fields that are complex conjugates of each other. These noise fields are exploited as the key and conjugate key in optical direct-sequence spread spectrum. The inverse process of parametric up-conversion is then used for multiplying the key by the conjugate key at the receiver in order to extract the transmitted data. A complete scheme for optical code-division multiple access (OCDMA) based on this approach is presented. The salient feature of the approach presented in this paper is that an ideal white-noise key is automatically generated, leading to high-capacity versatile code-division multiple-access configurations.

Cavity ring-up spectroscopy for ultrafast sensing with optical microresonators

Spectroscopy of whispering-gallery mode microresonators has become a powerful scientific tool, enabling the detection of single viruses, nanoparticles and even single molecules. Yet the demonstrated timescale of these schemes has been limited so far to milliseconds or more. Here we introduce a scheme that is orders of magnitude faster, capable of capturing complete spectral snapshots at nanosecond timescales—cavity ring-up spectroscopy. Based on sharply rising detuned probe pulses, cavity ring-up spectroscopy combines the sensitivity of heterodyne measurements with the highest-possible, transform-limited acquisition rate. As a demonstration, we capture spectra of microtoroid resonators at time intervals as short as 16 ns, directly monitoring submicrosecond dynamics of their optomechanical vibrations, thermorefractive response and Kerr nonlinearity. Cavity ring-up spectroscopy holds promise for the study of fast biological processes such as enzyme kinetics, protein folding and light harvesting, with applications in other fields such as cavity quantum electrodynamics and pulsed optomechanics.