A research group comprising Daniel Tasca, Matthew Edgar and Professor Miles Padgett from the School of Physics and Astronomy of the University of Glasgow has for the first time captured imagery of a quantum phenomenon called ‘quantum entanglement’ utilizing a highly-sensitive camera.
In quantum entanglement, two particles behave like a single system even when they are isolated by vast distances. The entangled particles are in a state of superposition in which individual state of the particles is unknown. Nevertheless, after the measurement or observation of one of the particles, the other particle will assume a correlated state instantly, apparently breaching the speed of light. Exploitation of such phenomenon finds use in communications encryption and in the development of quantum computation.
The research team performed the study in partnership with scientists from the University of Ottawa and Heriot-Watt University. In the study, the researchers used the camera to measure intense spatial entanglement of photons, which are light particles. Leveraging a 201 by 201 pixel array, the camera was able to capture the entire field of the quantum light, while enabling the researchers to observe as high as 2,500 different entangled states or dimensions.
Using a special crystal, entangled photons were generated by splitting one photon into two. By capturing images of photon pairs, the researchers were able to measure correlations in the positions of the photons to a level that is not possible in classical physics. Padgett stated that every pixel carries its own information, thus paving the way to transform quantum secured communication’s data capacity. This work is a significant progress towards the realization of future quantum technologies and demonstrates that cameras are capable of guiding to new quantum information science capabilities.
The study titled ‘Imaging high-dimensional spatial entanglement with a camera’ has appeared in Nature Communications.
Source: http://www.gla.ac.uk/