2003/06/24 by K. L. Pregnell, David T. Pegg, D. T. Pegg · 1 citation
Computer Science · Physics and Astronomy · #Quantum Information and Cryptography #Quantum optics and atomic interactions #Spectroscopy and Quantum Chemical Studies #quant-ph
paper · pdf · doi:10.1103/physreva.67.063814
published as Phys. Rev. A, 67, 063814 (2003) · 8 Pages, 4 figures
openalex publication_date 2003/06/24 · arxiv created 2005/08/23 · arxiv updated 2009/12/01 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/30
We show that the eight-port interferometer used by Noh, Foug\`eres, and Mandel [Phys. Rev. Lett. 71, 2579 (1993)] to measure their operational phase distribution of light can also be used to measure the canonical phase distribution of weak optical fields, where canonical phase is defined as the complement of photon number. A binomial reference state is required for this purpose, which we show can be obtained to an excellent degree of approximation from a suitably squeezed state. The proposed method requires only photodetectors that can distinguish among zero photons, one photon, and more than one photon and is not particularly sensitive to photodetector imperfections.