Beamlike high-brightness source of polarization-entangled photon pairs

We report on an ultrabright beamlike source of polarization-entangled photon pairs that is suitable for the task of multiphoton quantum information processing. The photon pairs are generated from a beamlike type-II parametric downconversion process in two adjacently located but 180 degrees rotated beta-barium berate crystals. Approximately 30,000 s(-1) entangled photon pairs are recorded experimentally with only 100 mW pump power. The fidelity of the generated entangled state as compared with a Bell state is measured to be 0.974 with the method of quantum state tomography. With this source, we also obtain a violation of Bell's inequality by 61 standard deviations in just a few seconds. (C) 2008 Optical Society of America.