Strongly correlated photons on a chip

TL;DR

This paper demonstrates strong quantum correlations between photons in a chip-based system using quantum dots in photonic crystal nanocavities, showing non-linear effects at the single-photon level crucial for quantum technologies.

Contribution

It reports the first observation of photon antibunching and bunching in a chip-integrated system, evidencing unprecedented strong single-photon non-linearities.

Findings

Photon antibunching proves photon blockade effect.

Photon bunching indicates joint injection of two photons.

Results enable development of single-photon transistors.

Abstract

Optical non-linearities at the single-photon level are key ingredients for future photonic quantum technologies. Prime candidates for the realization of strong photon-photon interactions necessary for implementing quantum information processing tasks as well as for studying strongly correlated photons in an integrated photonic device setting are quantum dots embedded in photonic crystal nanocavities. Here, we report strong quantum correlations between photons on picosecond timescales. We observe (a) photon antibunching upon resonant excitation of the lowest-energy polariton state, proving that the first cavity photon blocks the subsequent injection events, and (b) photon bunching when the laser field is in two-photon resonance with the polariton eigenstates of the second Jaynes-Cummings manifold, demonstrating that two photons at this color are more likely to be injected into the cavity jointly, than they would otherwise. Together,these results demonstrate unprecedented strong single-photon non-linearities, paving the way for realizing a single-photon transistor or a quantum optical Josephson interferometer.