Abstract
Measurement connects the world of quantum phenomena to the world of classical events. It has both a passive role—in observing quantum systems—and an active one, in preparing quantum states and controlling them. In view of the central status of measurement in quantum mechanics, it is surprising that there is no general recipe for designing a detector that measures a given observable1. Compounding this, the characterization of existing detectors is typically based on partial calibrations or elaborate models. Thus, experimental specification (that is, tomography) of a detector is of fundamental and practical importance. Here, we present the realization of quantum detector tomography2,3,4. We identify the positive-operator-valued measure describing the detector, with no ancillary assumptions. This result completes the triad, state5,6,7,8,9,10,11, process12,13,14,15,16,17 and detector tomography, required to fully specify an experiment. We characterize an avalanche photodiode and a photon-number-resolving detector capable of detecting up to eight photons18. This creates a new set of tools for accurately detecting and preparing non-classical light.
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Acknowledgements
This work has been supported by the EU integrated project QAP and STREP COMPAS, EPSRC grants EP/C546237/1 and QIP-IRC, the Royal Society, Microsoft Research and the EURYI Award Scheme. H.C.-R. has been supported by the European Commission under the Marie Curie Programme and by the Heinz-Durr Programme of the Studienstiftung des dt. Volkes.
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J.S.L., H.C-R. and I.A.W. contributed to the concept of the experiment and its design, as well as to laboratory measurements and data analysis. A.F., K.L.P., M.B.P. and J.E. contributed modelling and data analysis. Ch. S. and T.C.R. contributed to the conception of the project and to its planning.
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Lundeen, J., Feito, A., Coldenstrodt-Ronge, H. et al. Tomography of quantum detectors. Nature Phys 5, 27–30 (2009). https://doi.org/10.1038/nphys1133
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/nphys1133
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