Long-lifetime coherence in a quantum emitter induced by a metasurface

Emmanuel Lassalle (1) , Philippe Lalanne (2) , Syed Aljunid (3) , Patrice Genevet (4) , Brian Stout (1) , Thomas Durt (1, 5) , David Wilkowski (3, 6, 7)

1 FRESNEL - Institut FRESNEL
2 LP2N - Laboratoire Photonique, Numérique et Nanosciences
3 Nanyang Technological University [Singapour]
4 CRHEA - Centre de recherche sur l'hétéroepitaxie et ses applications
5 CLARTE - CLARTE
6 CQT - Centre for Quantum Technologies [Singapore]
7 International joint research unit UMUI 3654

An anisotropic quantum vacuum (AQV) has been predicted to induce quantum interferences during the spontaneous emission process in an atomic V transition [G. S. Agarwal, Phys. Rev. Lett. 84, 5500 (2000)]. Nevertheless, the finite lifetime of the excited states is expected to strongly limit the observability of this phenomenon. In this paper, we predict that an AQV can induce a long-lifetime coherence in an atomic Λ transition from the process of spontaneous emission, which has an additional advantage of removing the need for coherent laser excitation. We also carry out two metasurface designs and compare their respective efficiencies for creating an AQV over remote distances. The detection of this coherence induced by a metasurface, in addition to being yet another vindication of quantum electrodynamics, could pave the way towards the remote distance control of coherent coupling between quantum emitters, which is a key requirement to produce entanglement in quantum technology applications.

Domains: Optics [physics.optics]

Emmanuel Lassalle, Philippe Lalanne, Syed Aljunid, Patrice Genevet, Brian Stout, et al.. Long-lifetime coherence in a quantum emitter induced by a metasurface. Physical Review A, 2020, 101 (1), ⟨10.1103/PhysRevA.101.013837⟩. ⟨hal-02997834⟩