Quantum statistics engineering in a hybrid nanoparticle-emitter-cavity system

Abstract

Quantum engineering of photons is a key requirement for the development of quantum technology. Here, we put forward a scheme to investigate extensively quantum statistical characteristics of the photons and their engineering in a hybrid nanoparticle-emitter-cavity architecture through placing a nanoparticle (NP) and a quantum emitter (QE), called NP-QE molecule, into an optical cavity, where the coherent tripartite coupling emerges in the interactions among the NP, QE, and cavity. The photons are collected from the two different channels, i.e., the cavity emission and the NP-QE molecule scattering. Due to the composite nature of the tripartite dressed excitations of our fully coupled system and the destructive interference between different transition pathways for the two-photon excitation, the nontrivial quantum statistical properties, such as unconventional single-photon blockade and strong photon superbunching, can be achieved even within the bad cavity limit (without the need of the strong-coupling condition) when the NP-QE molecule is driven by an external laser not interacting the cavity mode. It is also revealed that the photon autocorrelation and cross-correlation properties are well modified by regulating the size-dependent system parameters, such as the NP-to-QE distance and the NP radius. The small-coupling strength required, the ease of parameter tuning, the relaxation of high-cavity quality factor, and the robustness to the dephasing rate in realistic scenarios all benefit the generation of single-photon sources, which has potential applications in quantum information and quantum communication.