Several aspects of people’s daily lives can be completely transformed with superfast quantum computers and communication devices.
However, to achieve that, researchers first need a fast, efficient source of photon pairs that are used by such systems to disseminate and manipulate information.
At the Stevens Institute of Technology, scientists have recently done just that. They developed a chip-based photon source that is 100 times more efficient compared to earlier ones. The study could soon enable the major integration of a quantum device.
It has long been suspected that this was possible in theory, but we are the first to show it in practice.
Yuping Huang, Associate Professor of Knowledge Gallagher, Stevens Institute of Technology
Huang is also the director of the Center for Quantum Science and Engineering.
Researchers create photon pairs by capturing light in carefully carved nanoscale microcavities. When light circulates inside the cave, its photons tend to relax and separate in couples involved.
However, there is a downside: at the moment, these systems are highly inefficient and require a torch of incoming laser light with several million photons before a single photon pair can engage. at the other end.
Now, Huang and his team at Stevens have created a new chip-based photon source that is 100 times more efficient compared to any earlier device, thus enabling tens of millions of photon pairs to be charged. introduction within a second using a single microwatt-powered laser beam.
“This is a major milestone for quantum communication, ”Said Huang, whose study was published on Dec. 17th, 2020, iris de Corporate Review Letters.
Huang collaborated with graduate students Stevens Zhaohui Ma and Jiayang Chen to study his laboratory earlier to develop very high microcavities to flakes of lithium niobate crystal. The caves are in the shape of a race and appear inside photons with the least amount of energy loss, thus allowing light to circulate longer and interact with greater efficiency.
The additional factors fine-tuned as temperature and produced an unparalleled clear source of photon pairs. In a practical sense, this enables photon pairs to be formed in much higher sizes for a given amount of incoming light, thus reducing the energy required to process quantum parts. driving.
The researchers have been working on ways to streamline their process and add that they plan to soon achieve the true Holy Grail of quantum optics – a system with the capability of one turn an incoming photon into an outgoing pair of photons, with almost zero waste of energy along the way.
It is certainly achievable. At this stage we only need gradual improvements.
Jiayang Chen, Graduate Student, Stevens Institute of Technology
In the meantime, the researchers plan to continue tuning their technology and look for ways to use their photon source to power logic gates and quantum computing or communications components. other. “Since this technology is already chip-based, we are ready to start scaling by integrating passive or other functional optical components, ”Huang noted.
According to Huang, the ultimate goal is to make quantum devices as cost-effective and efficient as possible so that they can be integrated into mainstream electronic devices.
We want to take quantum technology out of the lab, so that it benefits all of us. Someday soon we want children to have quantum laptops in their backpacks, and we are pushing hard to make that happen.
Yuping Huang, Associate Professor of Knowledge Gallagher, Stevens Institute of Technology
Source: https://www.stevens.edu/