Quantum light in the turbulent atmosphere

TL;DR

This paper investigates how quantum properties of light are affected by atmospheric turbulence, showing that nonclassical features are more resilient in weak light fields and that transmission effects can be reconstructed via homodyne detection.

Contribution

It introduces a numerical simulation approach to analyze the probability distribution of transmission coefficients and demonstrates the robustness of nonclassical features in turbulent conditions.

Findings

Nonclassical properties are more robust in weak light fields.

Homodyne detection can reconstruct the transmission coefficient distribution.

Nonclassical photon statistics are resilient against turbulence in weak fields.

Abstract

Nonclassical properties of light propagating through the turbulent atmosphere are studied. We demonstrate by numerical simulation that the probability distribution of the transmission coefficient, which characterizes the effects of the atmosphere on the quantum state of light, can be reconstructed by homodyne detection. Nonclassical photon-statistics and, more generally, nonclassical Glauber-Sudarshan functions appear to be more robust against turbulence for weak light fields rather than for bright ones.