Photon subtracted squeezed states generated with periodically poled KTiOPO4

We present generation of photon-subtracted squeezed states at 860 nm, from nearly pure, continuous-wave squeezed vacua generated with a periodically-poled KTiOPO4 crystal as a nonlinear medium of a subthreshold optical parametric oscillator. We observe various kinds of photon-subtracted squeezed states, including non-Gaussian states similar to the single-photon state and superposition states of coherent states, simply by changing the pump power. Nonclassicality of the generated states clearly shows up as its negative region around the origin of the phase-space distributions, i.e., the Wigner functions. We obtain the value, -0.083 at the origin of the Wigner function, which is largest ever observed without any correction for experimental imperfections. (c) 2007 Optical Society of America.