Optimized Design of the Lithium Niobate for Spectrally-Pure-State Generation at MIR Wavelengths Using Metaheuristic Algorithm

Quantum light sources in the mid-infrared (MIR) band play an important role in many applications, such as quantum sensing, quantum imaging, and quantum communication. However, there is still a lack of high-quality quantum light sources in the MIR band, such as the spectrally pure single-photon source. In this work, the generation of a spectrally-pure state in an optimized poled lithium niobate crystal using a metaheuristic algorithm is presented. In particular, the particle swarm optimization algorithm is adopted to optimize the duty cycle of the poling period of the lithium niobate crystal. With this approach, the spectral purity can be improved from 0.820 to 0.998 under the third group-velocity-matched condition, and the wavelength-tunable range from 3.0 to 4.0 mu m for the degenerate case and 3.0 to 3.7 mu m for the nondegenerate case. This work paves the way for developing quantum photonic technologies at the MIR wavelength band.

Automated summary

This work presents a method to generate a spectrally-pure state in an optimized poled lithium niobate crystal using a metaheuristic algorithm, paving the way for developing quantum photonic technologies in the mid-infrared wavelength band.