Double-slit quantum eraser
Abstract
We report a quantum eraser experiment which actually uses a Young double slit to create interference. The experiment can be considered an optical analogy of an experiment proposed by Scully, Englert, and Walther [Nature (London) 351, 111 (1991)]. One photon of an entangled pair is incident on a Young double slit of appropriate dimensions to create an interference pattern in a distant detection region. Quarter-wave plates, oriented so that their fast axes are orthogonal, are placed in front of each slit to serve as which-path markers. The quarter-wave plates mark the polarization of the interfering photon and thus destroy the interference pattern. To recover interference, we measure the polarization of the other entangled photon. In addition, we perform the experiment under ``delayed erasure'' circumstances.
- Publication:
-
Physical Review A
- Pub Date:
- March 2002
- DOI:
- 10.1103/PhysRevA.65.033818
- arXiv:
- arXiv:quant-ph/0106078
- Bibcode:
- 2002PhRvA..65c3818W
- Keywords:
-
- 42.50.Dv;
- 03.65.Ta;
- 42.50.Ar;
- 42.25.Kb;
- Nonclassical states of the electromagnetic field including entangled photon states;
- quantum state engineering and measurements;
- Foundations of quantum mechanics;
- measurement theory;
- Photon statistics and coherence theory;
- Coherence;
- Quantum Physics
- E-Print:
- 7 pages, 9 figures, Submitted to Phys. Rev. A