Assessing the Polarization of a Quantum Field from Stokes Fluctuation

TL;DR

This paper introduces a new operational measure for the polarization of quantum fields based on Stokes vector fluctuations, addressing limitations of standard definitions and demonstrating its experimental applicability.

Contribution

It proposes a novel degree of polarization defined via Stokes fluctuation minimization, improving upon existing measures and validated through experiments with squeezed states.

Findings

The new degree of polarization avoids issues of standard definitions.

Experimental validation with bright squeezed and quadrature squeezed vacuum states.

Demonstrates practical measurement of quantum polarization.

Abstract

We propose an operational degree of polarization in terms of the variance of the projected Stokes vector minimized over all the directions of the Poincar\'e sphere. We examine the properties of this degree and show that some problems associated with the standard definition are avoided. The new degree of polarization is experimentally determined using two examples: a bright squeezed state and a quadrature squeezed vacuum.