Quantum Light Enterprise

Informations projet

QLite

N° de convention de subvention: 812763

DOI

10.3030/812763

Projet clôturé

Date de signature de la CE 13 Août 2018

Date de début 1 Janvier 2019

Date de fin 31 Decembre 2019

Financé au titre de

• EXCELLENT SCIENCE - European Research Council (ERC)

Coût total

€ 262 350,00

Contribution de l’UE

€ 149 850,00

Coordonné par

UNIVERSITY OF HAMBURG
Germany

Periodic Reporting for period 1 - QLite (Quantum Light Enterprise)

Période du rapport: 2019-01-01 au 2019-12-31

Résumé du contexte et des objectifs généraux du projet

All commercially available laser devices produce light that shows remaining noise in frequency as well as power. This is due to a rather fundamental issue – the quantisation of light into photons. Research laboratories in the field of quantum optics, however, have been able to generate laser light with reduced (‘squeezed’) photon noise by producing quantum correlations between the photons using wavelength conversion of the light. Since 2019 this new technology has been being used in all gravitational-wave observatories for achieving better resolution in the observation of black hole and neutron star mergers in deep space.
The ERC-2018-PoC project 'QLite' has researched and developed technology that is necessary to commercialize continuous-wave laser light with squeezed photon noise at 1550nm wavelength. ‘Squeezed light’ at 1550nm (and also at other wavelengths) has very high innovative potential within the envisioned 2nd quantum revolution. ‘Squeezed light’ increases the measurement sensitivity of optical contact-free vibration measurements in industry. It allows for the calibration of photometers without a lamp of calibrated spectral radiance. It improves the security level in quantum key distribution (QKD) for secure optical communication. Most likely, more applications will be discovered in future. Within ‘QLite’ a rather compact squeezed-light laser device with a footprint of 80cm x 80cm was fabricated and its stable operation characterized. It was proven that the QLite laser improves measurements of acoustic vibrations over most of the audio band. The device represents a first step towards a commercial product.