Single-molecule vacuum Rabi splitting: four-wave mixing and optical switching at the single-photon level

TL;DR

This paper demonstrates that a single organic molecule in a cavity quantum electrodynamics setup can serve as an efficient nonlinear optical element, enabling single-photon sensitivity and all-optical switching for integrated photonics at very low powers.

Contribution

It introduces the use of single organic molecules as nonlinear optical elements in the strong coupling regime, enabling efficient nonlinear effects at the single-photon level.

Findings

Single-molecule cavity QED achieves strong coupling.

Demonstration of single-photon nonlinear signal generation.

Realization of all-optical switching at low power levels.

Abstract

A single quantum emitter can possess a very strong intrinsic nonlinearity, but its overall promise for nonlinear effects is hampered by the challenge of efficient coupling to incident photons. Common nonlinear optical materials, on the other hand, are easy to couple to but are bulky, imposing a severe limitation on the miniaturization of photonic systems. In this work, we show that a single organic molecule acts as an extremely efficient nonlinear optical element in the strong coupling regime of cavity quantum electrodynamics. We report on single-photon sensitivity in nonlinear signal generation and all-optical switching. Our work promotes the use of molecules for applications such as integrated photonic circuits, operating at very low powers.