Three-Photon Discrete-Energy-Entangled W State in an Optical Fiber.

We experimentally demonstrate the generation of a three-photon discrete-energy-entangled W state using multiphoton-pair generation by spontaneous four-wave mixing in an optical fiber. We show that, by making use of prior information on the photon source, we can verify the state produced by this source without resorting to frequency conversion.

Dual-pump approach to photon-pair generation: demonstration of enhanced characterization and engineering capabilities.

We experimentally study the generation of photon pairs via spontaneous four-wave mixing with two distinct laser pulses. We find that the dual-pump technique enables new capabilities: 1) a new characterization methodology to measure noise contributions, source brightness and photon-collection efficiencies directly from raw photon-count measurements; 2) an enhanced ability to generate heralded single photons in a pure quantum state; and 3) the ability to derive upper and lower bounds on heralded-photon quantum state purity from measurements of photon-number statistics even in the presence of noise. Such features are highly valuable in photon-pair sources for quantum applications.

Large spin Hall angle in vanadium film.

We report a large spin Hall angle observed in vanadium films sputter-grown at room temperature, which have small grain size and consist of a mixture of body centered tetragonal (bct) and body centered cubic (bcc) structures. The spin Hall angle is as large as θ V = -0.071 ± 0.003, comparable to that of platinum, θ Pt = 0.076 ± 0.007, and is much larger than that of bcc V film grown at 400 °C, θ V_bcc = -0.012 ± 0.002. Similar to ß-tantalum and ß-tungsten, the sputter-grown V films also have a high resistivity of more than 200 µΩ∙cm. Surprisingly, the spin diffusion length is still long at 16.3 nm. This finding not only indicates that specific crystalline structure can lead to a large spin Hall effect but also suggests 3d light metals should not be ruled out in the search for materials with large spin Hall angle.

Multidimensional characterization of an entangled photon-pair source via stimulated emission tomography.

Using stimulated emission tomography, we characterize an entangled photon-pair source in the energy and polarization degrees of freedom, with a precision far exceeding what could be obtained by quantum state tomography. Through this multidimensional tomography we find that energy-polarization correlations are a cause of polarization-entanglement degradation, demonstrating that this technique provides useful information for source engineering and can accelerate the development of quantum information processing systems dependent on many degrees of freedom.

Multimode memories in atomic ensembles.

The ability to store multiple optical modes in a quantum memory allows for increased efficiency of quantum communication and computation. Here we compute the multimode capacity of a variety of quantum memory protocols based on light storage in ensembles of atoms. We find that adding a controlled inhomogeneous broadening improves this capacity significantly.

Ultrafast optical spectroscopy of spectral fluctuations in a dense atomic vapor.

Transient four-wave mixing experiments with 100 fs pulses in a dense potassium vapor probe the electronic energy fluctuations that lead to optical decoherence. Echo-peak shift experiments yield a biexponential two-time correlation function of energy level fluctuations. Molecular dynamics simulations show that the slow component is a many-body excitonic contribution arising from long-range resonant interactions. The decay of the correlation function occurs on comparable time scales in theory and experiment.

High-density, high-temperature alkali vapor cell.

We present a vapor cell design that enables resonant optical spectroscopy in high-density, high-temperature alkali metal vapors. Optical access is provided via reflection from the interface between the vapor and a sapphire window. The cell resists corrosion from the highly reactive alkali vapors, in our case, potassium, up to 800 degrees C (number densities up to 10(19) cm(-3)). The cells maintain their integrity for an average of 100 h above 500 degrees C with about 10 heating/cooling cycles.

Non-Markovian dynamics in a dense potassium vapor.

Transient four-wave mixing experiments on a dense potassium vapor, which has a dephasing time long compared to the collision duration, reveal distinct signatures of non-Markovian dynamics. Theoretical fits assuming stochastic fluctuation of the excited-state frequencies confirm that the two-time correlation function has a finite temporal width.