Related papers: A self-interfering clock as a "which path" witness
It is often conjectured that a choice of time function merely sets up a frame for the quantum evolution of gravitational field, meaning that all choices should be in some sense compatible. In order to explore this conjecture (and the…
Wave-particle duality is certainly one of the most curious concepts of contemporary physics, which ascribes mutually exclusive behaviors to quantum systems that cannot be observed simultaneously. In the context of two-path interferometers,…
We demonstrate a novel second-order spatial interference effect between two indistinguishable pairs of disjoint optical paths from a single chaotic source. Beside providing a deeper understanding of the physics of multi-photon interference…
Interference is fundamental to wave dynamics and quantum mechanics. The quantum wave properties of particles are exploited in metrology using atom interferometers, allowing for high-precision inertia measurements [1, 2]. Furthermore, the…
We argue that (1) our perception of time through change and (2) the gap between reality and our observation of it are at the heart of both quantum mechanics and the dynamical mechanism of physical systems. We suggest that the origin of…
The hypothesis of quantum self-interference is not directly observable, but has at least three necessary implications. First, a quantum entity must have no less than two open paths. Second, the size of the interval between any two…
A technique complementary to those for spectral lines is proposed for the observation of continuum radiation. As, quantum mechanically, the radiation is a mixture of pure states, it should be possible to measure the temporal coherence of…
Thanks to common-mode noise rejection, differential configurations are crucial for realistic applications of phase and frequency estimation with atom interferometers. Currently, differential protocols with uncorrelated particles and…
Interferometers provide a highly sensitive means to investigate and exploit the coherence properties of light in metrology applications. However, interferometers come in various forms and exploit different properties of the optical states…
We have constructed an efficient source of photon pairs using a waveguide-type nonlinear device and performed a two-photon interference experiment with an unbalanced Michelson interferometer. Parametric down-converted photons from the…
Using the projection evolution (PEv) approach, time can be included in the quantum mechanics as an observable. Having the time operator, it is possible to explore the temporal structure of various quantum events. In the present paper we…
We investigate wave-particle duality in a symmetric two-way interferometer with a which-way detector. We find that it is important to state wether the interfering object or the which-way detector is read out first. In case that the…
We demonstrate a standing wave light pulse sequence that places atoms into a superposition of displaced wavepackets with precisely controlled displacements that remain constant for times as long as 1 s. The separated wavepackets are…
The theory of relativity associates a proper time with each moving object via its world line. In quantum theory however, such well-defined trajectories are forbidden. After introducing a general characterisation of quantum clocks, we…
Quantum interference is typically detected through the dependence of the interference signal on certain parameters (path length, Aharonov-Bohm flux, etc.), which can be varied in a controlled manner. The destruction of interference by a…
We present a technique to completely characterise the spectral-temporal wave function of a broadband photon pair using spectral-shearing interferometry. Our method is fully self-referencing and is generalisable across a wide range of…
We have implemented an optical quantum eraser with the aim of studying this phenomenon in the context of state discrimination. An interfering single photon is entangled with another one serving as a which-path marker. As a consequence, the…
We study the use of the Faraday effect as a quantum clock for measuring traversal times of evanescent photons through magneto-refractive structures. The Faraday effect acts both as a phase-shifter and as a filter for circular polarizations.…
A pulse of matter waves may dramatically change its shape when traversing an absorbing barrier with time-dependent transparency. Here we show that this effect can be utilized for controlled manipulation of spatially-localized quantum…
We theoretically analyse an autonomous clock comprising a nanoelectromechanical system, which undergoes self-oscillations driven by electron tunnelling. The periodic mechanical motion behaves as the clockwork, similar to the swinging of a…