Polarization coincidence images from metasurfaces with HOM-type interference

Metasurface for programmable quantum algorithms with classical and quantum light

Metasurfaces have recently opened up applications in the quantum regime, including quantum tomography and the generation of quantum entangled states. With their capability to store a vast amount of information by utilizing the various geometric degrees of freedom of nanostructures, metasurfaces are expected to be useful for processing quantum information. Here, we propose and experimentally demonstrate a programmable metasurface capable of performing quantum algorithms using both classical and quantum light with single photons. Our approach encodes multiple programmable quantum algorithms and operations, such as Grover's search algorithm and the quantum Fourier transform, onto the same metalens array on a metasurface. A spatial light modulator selectively excites different sets of metalenses to carry out the quantum algorithms, while the interference patterns captured by a single-photon camera are used to extract information about the output state at the selected output directions. Our programmable quantum metasurface approach holds promising potential as a cost-effective means of miniaturizing components for quantum computing and information processing.

Metasurface for complete measurement of polarization Bell state

Bell state measurement is vital to quantum information technology. Conventional linear optical elements, however, cannot fully distinguish all polarization Bell states without assisting of additional degrees of freedom. Leveraging on a pair of binary-pixel metasurfaces, we demonstrate direct measurement of all four polarization Bell states. Each metasurface is designed to produce two output modes that linearly superpose three Bell states in the coincidence counting measurement. By rotating the polarizers, the coincidence counting measurement achieves a tunable anticorrelation between one and the other two Bell states, achieving Bell state detection efficiency of 75% in a single measurement. Complete and deterministic Bell state measurement is further realized by performing two measurements. Our work shows the advantage of utilization of metasurfaces in quantum detection schemes and is of great applicative interest for quantum dense coding, entanglement swapping, quantum teleportation protocols, and novel quantum information processing tasks.

Jones-matrix imaging based on two-photon interference

Two-photon interference is an important effect that is tightly related to the quantum nature of light. Recently, it has been shown that the photon bunching from the Hong-Ou-Mandel (HOM) effect can be used for quantum imaging in which sample properties (reflection/transmission amplitude, phase delay, or polarization) can be characterized at the pixel-by-pixel level. In this work, we perform Jones matrix imaging for an unknown object based on two-photon interference. By using a reference metasurface with panels of known polarization responses in pairwise coincidence measurements, the object's polarization responses at each pixel can be retrieved from the dependence of the coincidence visibility as a function of the reference polarization. The post-selection of coincidence images with specific reference polarization in our approach eliminates the need in switching the incident polarization and thus parallelized optical measurements for Jones matrix characterization. The parallelization in preparing input states, prevalent in any quantum algorithms, is an advantage of adopting two-photon interference in Jones matrix imaging. We believe our work points to the usage of metasurfaces in biological and medical imaging in the quantum optical regime.

Computing metasurfaces enabled chiral edge image sensing

Computing metasurfaces have shown the extraordinary ability to precisely perform optical analog operations to the input light wave, and therefore exhibit greater potentials toward sensing applications. Here, we propose a unique application of computing metasurface for chiral edge sensing by incorporating a weak-value amplification technique. The computing metasurface performs the spatial differentiation operations of phase objects and extracts the edge-enhanced images, because the phase gradient generally occurs at the edge. The chirality-induced polarization rotation acts as the preselection state and the spatial differentiation operations in the metasurface provide weak coupling. The amplified pointer shift related to the tiny polarization rotation will eventually lead to an asymmetric edge-enhanced image. Owing to the high sensitivity of the weak-value amplification, we experimentally demonstrate a high-contrast recognition of chirality by edge detection, which may have potential applications in real-time measurement and separation of chiral enantiomers.

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Computing metasurfaces perform the spatial differentiation operations of phase object

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Weak-value amplification technique has been proposed for the chiral sensing

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The chiral edge image sensing has been demonstrated