Quantum interference between non-identical single particles

TL;DR

This paper demonstrates quantum interference between non-identical particles, including photons and magnons, revealing new quantum statistical behaviors and extending the experimental study of quantum interference effects.

Contribution

It introduces a generalized beam splitter for non-identical particles and observes the crossover from bosonic to fermionic statistics by tuning non-Hermitian parameters.

Findings

High-visibility interference between photons and magnons

Observation of bosonic to fermionic crossover

Simulation of three-fermion behavior with photons

Abstract

Quantum interference between identical single particles reveals the intrinsic quantum statistic nature of particles, which could not be interpreted through classical physics. Here, we demonstrate quantum interference between non-identical bosons using a generalized beam splitter based on a quantum memory. The Hong-Ou-Mandel type interference between single photons and single magnons with high visibility is demonstrated, and the crossover from the bosonic to fermionic quantum statistics is observed by tuning the beam splitter to be non-Hermitian. Moreover, multi-particle interference that simulates the behavior of three fermions by three input photons is realized. Our work extends the understanding of the quantum interference effects and demonstrates a versatile experimental platform for studying and engineering quantum statistics of particles.