2015/10/14 by Serge Rosenblum, Orel Bechler, Itay Shomroni +3 · 4 citations
Computer Science · Mathematics · Physics and Astronomy · #Detector #Mathematics #Mechanical and Optical Resonators #Optics #Optoelectronics #Photon #Photon antibunching #Physics #Pulse (music) #Quantum Information and Cryptography #Quantum key distribution #Quantum optics and atomic interactions #Realization (probability) #Single-photon source #quant-ph
paper · pdf · doi:10.1038/nphoton.2015.227
To appear in Nature Photonics. 19 pages, 3 figures
arxiv created 2015/10/14 · openalex publication_date 2015/11/18 · arxiv updated 2016/01/20 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/08/05
Removing a single photon from a pulse is one of the most elementary operations that can be performed on light, having both fundamental significance and practical applications in quantum communication and computation. So far, photon subtraction, in which the removed photon is detected and therefore irreversibly lost, has been implemented in a probabilistic manner with inherently low success rates using low-reflectivity beam splitters. Here we demonstrate a scheme for the deterministic extraction of a single photon from an incoming pulse. The removed photon is diverted to a different mode, enabling its use for other purposes, such as a photon number-splitting attack on quantum key distribution protocols. Our implementation makes use of single-photon Raman interaction (SPRINT) with a single atom near a nanofibre-coupled microresonator. The single-photon extraction probability in our current realization is limited mostly by linear loss, yet probabilities close to unity should be attainable with realistic experimental parameters.