Interferometric detection of optical phase shifts at the Heisenberg limit

1993/08/30 by Murray Holland, K. Burnett · 9 citations
Engineering · Physics and Astronomy · #Geophysics and Sensor Technology #Quantum optics and atomic interactions #Cold Atom Physics and Bose-Einstein Condensates

paper · doi:10.1103/physrevlett.71.1355

openalex publication_date 1993/08/30 · openalex created_date 2016/06/24 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/28

Abstract

We show that the uncertainty in the relative quantum phase of two fields propagating in the arms of a Mach-Zehnder interferometer can be reduced to the Heisenberg limit by driving the interferometer with two Fock states containing equal numbers of photons. This leads to a minimum detectable phase shift far below that of any interferometer driven by a coherent light source.

Cited by

• Measurement compatibility in multiparameter quantum interferometry
• Coherent Collisions between Bose-Einstein Condensates
• Quantum-limited metrology in the presence of collisional dephasing
• Quantum polarization characterization and tomography
• Distributed Phase Sensing with Multiphoton States in Optical Interferometry
• Coherently driven photonic de Broglie Sagnac interferometer
• Sub-shot-noise phase sensitivity with a Bose-Einstein condensate Mach-Zehnder interferometer
• Two-mode Bose gas: Beyond classical squeezing
• Quantum entanglement [wikipedia]