Abstract
Well characterized photon number resolving detectors are a requirement for many applications ranging from quantum information and quantum metrology to the foundations of quantum mechanics. This prompts the necessity for reliable calibration techniques at the single photon level. In this paper we propose an innovative absolute calibration technique for photon number resolving detectors, using a pulsed heralded photon source based on parametric down conversion. The technique, being absolute, does not require reference standards and is independent upon the performances of the heralding detector. The method provides the results of quantum efficiency for the heralded detector as a function of detected photon numbers. Furthermore, we prove its validity by performing the calibration of a Transition Edge Sensor based detector, a real photon number resolving detector that has recently demonstrated its effectiveness in various quantum information protocols.
Highlights
Photon number resolving (PNR) detectors are a fundamental tool in many different fields of optical science and technology [1, 2] such as quantum metrology, super-resolution [4], foundations of quantum mechanics [5], quantum imaging [6] and quantum information [7, 8, 9]
In this paper we propose and demonstrate an absolute technique for measuring quantum efficiency, based on a parametric down conversion (PDC) heralded single photon source, but exploiting all the information obtained from the output of the PNR detector
As ξ is the probability of having a true heralding count, the probability of observing no photons on the PNR detector is the sum of the probability of non-detection of the heralded photons multiplied by the probability of having no accidental counts in the presence of a true heralding count and the probability of having no accidental counts in the presence of a heralding count due to stray light or dark counts: P(0) = ξ [(1 − γ)P(0)] + (1 − ξ )P(0), (1)
Summary
Photon number resolving (PNR) detectors are a fundamental tool in many different fields of optical science and technology [1, 2] such as quantum metrology (redefinition of the SI candela unit [3]), super-resolution [4], foundations of quantum mechanics [5], quantum imaging [6] and quantum information [7, 8, 9]. For measuring detection efficiency in the photon counting regime, where conventional standards are cumbersome, an efficient solution is given by Klyshko’s absolute calibration technique [24, 25, 26], which exploits parametric down conversion (PDC) as a source of heralded single photons Despite this technique being suggested in the seventies [27, 28], only in recent years has it developed from demonstrational experiments to more accurate calibrations [29, 30, 31, 32]. In this paper we propose and demonstrate an absolute technique for measuring quantum efficiency, based on a PDC heralded single photon source, but exploiting all the information obtained from the output of the PNR detector.
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