Nonlinear interferometer as a resource for maximally entangled photonic states: Application to interferometry

Nonlinear interferometers are Mach-Zehnder interferometers with Kerr media in either one or both arms. We refer to these devices, respectively, as the asymmetric and symmetric nonlinear interferometers. In the asymmetric case, with one input mode in the vacuum, it is possible to generate maximally entangled photonic states or superpositions of such states. We consider the device as a resource of entangled states for applications to Heisenberg-limited interferometry. Interferometry with the maximally entangled states cannot be performed by simply subtracting the output photocounts as in standard interferometry. Instead, one must perform parity measurements on only one of the output beams. We show that the symmetric nonlinear interferometer, with one input mode in the vacuum, may be used to perform such parity measurements. The same device is shown to produce, with an input coherent state and upon projective measurements, even or odd coherent states, examples of the Schrodinger-cat states.