Precisely determining photon-number in real time

Precisely determining photon-number in real time

Leonardo Assis Morais1,2, Till Weinhold1,2, Marcelo Pereira de Almeida1,2, Joshua Combes3, Markus Rambach1,2, Adriana Lita4, Thomas Gerrits4, Sae Woo Nam4, Andrew G. White1,2, and Geoff Gillett1,2,5

1Centre for Engineered Quantum Systems, University of Queensland, QLD 4072, Australia
2School of Mathematics and Physics, University of Queensland, QLD 4072, Australia
3Department of Electrical, Computer and Energy Engineering, University of Colorado Boulder, Boulder, Colorado 80309, USA
4National Institute of Standards and Technology, 325 Broadway, Boulder, Colorado 80305, USA
5Quantum Valley Ideas Lab, Waterloo, ON N2L 6R2, Canada

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Abstract

Superconducting transition-edge sensors (TES) are extremely sensitive microcalorimeters used as photon detectors with unparalleled energy resolution. They have found application from measuring astronomical spectra through to determining the quantum property of photon-number, $hat{n} {=} hat{a}^† hat{a}$, for energies from 0.6-2.33eV. However, achieving optimal energy resolution requires considerable data acquisition – on the order of 1GB/min – followed by post-processing, which does not allow access to energy information in real time. Here we use a custom hardware processor to process TES pulses while new detections are still being registered, allowing photon-number to be measured in real time as well as reducing data requirements by orders-of-magnitude. We resolve photon number up to $n=16$ – achieving up to parts-per-billion discrimination for low photon numbers on the fly – providing transformational capacity for applications of TES detectors from astronomy through to quantum technology.

Transition-edge sensors (TES) are microcalorimeters that can achieve energy resolution in the order of a few eV’s and perform photon-number-resolving measurements with extremely high efficiency. In this work, we developed a photon detection system that uses a field-programmable gate array (FPGA) to digitise and analyse the TES pulse instantaneously, which allows us to perform real-time photon-number-resolving measurements. We show that we can use the detection system for an extensive range of photon numbers up to 16. Additionally, for low photon numbers, we achieved parts-per-billion discrimination. Among the potential applications, we highlight its use for continuous variable quantum computing, where photon number measurements can function as a non-gaussian resource, a required ingredient for universal quantum computing.

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