Nanophotonic coherent light–matter interfaces based on rare-earth-doped crystals
Abstract
Quantum light–matter interfaces connecting stationary qubits to photons will enable optical networks for quantum communications, precise global time keeping, photon switching and studies of fundamental physics. Rare-earth-ion-doped crystals are state-of-the-art materials for optical quantum memories and quantum transducers between optical photons, microwave photons and spin waves. Here we demonstrate coupling of an ensemble of neodymium rare-earth-ions to photonic nanocavities fabricated in the yttrium orthosilicate host crystal. Cavity quantum electrodynamics effects including Purcell enhancement (F=42) and dipole-induced transparency are observed on the highly coherent ^4I_(9/2)–^4F_(3/2) optical transition. Fluctuations in the cavity transmission due to statistical fine structure of the atomic density are measured, indicating operation at the quantum level. Coherent optical control of cavity-coupled rare-earth ions is performed via photon echoes. Long optical coherence times (T_2~100 μs) and small inhomogeneous broadening are measured for the cavity-coupled rare-earth ions, thus demonstrating their potential for on-chip scalable quantum light–matter interfaces.
Additional Information
© 2015 Macmillan Publishers Limited. This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article's Creative Commons license, unless indicated otherwise in the credit line; if the material is not included under the Creative Commons license, users will need to obtain permission from the license holder to reproduce the material. To view a copy of this license, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ Received 15 May 2015; Accepted 29 July 2015; Published 14 September 2015. We gratefully acknowledge the contributions of Alexander E. Hartz. This work was funded by California Institute of Technology (Caltech) and National Science Foundation (NSF) CAREER award number 1454607. Equipment funding was also provided by the Institute of Quantum Information and Matter (IQIM), an NSF Physics Frontiers Center with support of the Moore Foundation. The device nanofabrication was performed in the Kavli Nanoscience Institute at Caltech. Contributions: A.F. and T.Z. conceived the experiments. T.Z. and E.M. performed the simulations and T.Z. fabricated the devices. T.Z. and J.M.K. performed the measurements and analysed the data. T.Z. and A.F. wrote the manuscript with input from all authors. The authors declare no competing financial interests.Attached Files
Published - ncomms9206.pdf
Submitted - 1507.00977v1.pdf
Supplemental Material - ncomms9206-s1.pdf
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Additional details
- PMCID
- PMC4647856
- Eprint ID
- 60369
- Resolver ID
- CaltechAUTHORS:20150921-102021296
- NSF
- ECCS-1454607
- NSF
- PHY-1125565
- Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation
- GBMF-12500028
- Institute for Quantum Information and Matter (IQIM)
- NSF Physics Frontiers Center
- Caltech
- Created
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2015-09-21Created from EPrint's datestamp field
- Updated
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2022-05-23Created from EPrint's last_modified field
- Caltech groups
- Institute for Quantum Information and Matter, Kavli Nanoscience Institute