Abstract
Single-photon interference occurs when, with a perfectly efficient detector, the mean time interval between the detection of successive photons is much greater than the time taken by light to travel through the system. If interference is a phenomenon involving the interaction of at least two particles, interference effects should become weaker as the number of photons decreases and disappear completely when only one photon is in the apparatus at a time. An approximation to a single-photon state can be prepared by generating a pair of photons. In this case, the detection of one photon acts as a signal that a second photon is present in the field. With a single-photon state, quantum mechanics predict a perfect anti-correlation between the counts at the two output ports of beamsplitters. The indivisibility of the photon is because of the entanglement of the input field with the vacuum field. It follows that any analysis of the effect of a beamsplitter on a beam of light with definite photon number must take into account the vacuum field at the unused input port.
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