Licensable Technologies : Physics & Chemistry : Lasers/Photonics/Optics

Ultra-Bright Source of Polarization-Entangled Photons

Abstract
The utilization of a process of spontaneous parametric down-conversion in a novel two-crystal geometry to provide a source of polarization-entangled photon pairs that is more than ten times brighter, per unit of pump power, than previous sources, with another factor of 30 to 75 expected to be readily achievable. A high level of entanglement between photons emitted over a relatively large collection angle, and over a 10 nm bandwidth, is a characteristic of the invention. As a demonstration of the source capabilities, a 242-? violation of Bell’s inequalities was attained in fewer than three minutes, and near-perfect photon correlations were achieved when the collection efficiency was reduced. In addition, both the degree of entanglement and the purity of the state are readily tunable.

IP Status: Available both Exclusively and Non Exclusively

Reference Number: 555

S Number: DOE reference no.(s): 91,729

Patents & Applications:
United States National Patent Number 6424665 Issued on 07/23/2002

Posted: 10-01-2004

Contact
John Russell
Technology Transfer Division
Los Alamos National Laboratory
P.O. Box 1663, MailStop C334
(505) 665-3941
jrussell@lanl.gov