Photon-number correlations by photon-number resolving detectors

We demonstrate that by using pairs of photodetectors endowed with internal gain we are able to quantify the photon-number correlation coefficient between the two components of a pulsed bipartite state in the mesoscopic intensity regime (less than 100 mean photons). We compare the performances of hybrid photoemissive detectors to those of multipixel silicon photon counters and demonstrate that the absence of significant noise allows the evaluation of the variance of the distribution of the differences in photon numbers, and hence of the shot-noise level, without any correction. (C) 2010 Optical Society of America