Single-photons are key elements of many future quantum technologies, be it for the realisation of large-scale quantum communication networks 1 for quantum simulation of chemical and physical processes 2 or for connecting quantum memories in a quantum computer 3 . Scaling quantum technologies will thus require efficient, on-demand, sources of highly indistinguishable single-photons 4 . Semiconductor quantum dots inserted in photonic structures are ultrabright single photon sources [5][6][7] , but the photon indistinguishability is limited by charge noise induced by nearby surfaces 8 . The current state of the art for indistinguishability are parametric down conversion single-photon sources, but they intrinsically generate multiphoton events and hence must be operated at very low brightness to maintain high single photon purity 9,10 . To date, no technology has proven to be capable of providing a source that simultaneously generates near-unity indistinguishability and pure single-photons with high brightness. Here, we report on such devices made of quantum dots in electrically controlled cavity structures. We demonstrate on-demand, bright and ultra-pure single photon generation. Application of an electrical bias on deterministically fabricated devices 11,12 is shown to fully cancel charge noise effects. Under resonant excitation, an indistinguishability of 0.9956±0.0045 is evidenced with a g (2) (0)=0.0028±0.0012. The photon extraction of 65% and measured brightness of 0.154±0.015 make this source 20 times brighter than any source of equal quality. This new generation of sources open the way to a new level of complexity and scalability in optical quantum manipulation.

We report the realization of a quantum circuit in which an ensemble of electronic spins is coupled to a frequency tunable superconducting resonator. The spins are nitrogen-vacancy centers in a diamond crystal. The achievement of strong coupling is manifested by the appearance of a vacuum Rabi splitting in the transmission spectrum of the resonator when its frequency is tuned through the nitrogen-vacancy center electron spin resonance.

Following a recent proposal by S. B. Zheng and G. C. Guo [Phys. Rev. Lett. 85, 2392 (2000)], we report an experiment in which two Rydberg atoms crossing a nonresonant cavity are entangled by coherent energy exchange. The process, mediated by the virtual emission and absorption of a microwave photon, is characterized by a collision mixing angle 4 orders of magnitude larger than for atoms colliding in free space with the same impact parameter. The final entangled state is controlled by adjusting the atom-cavity detuning. This procedure, essentially insensitive to thermal fields and to photon decay, opens promising perspectives for complex entanglement manipulations.

Present-day implementations of quantum information processing rely on two widely different types of quantum bits (qubits). On the one hand, microscopic systems such as atoms or spins are naturally well decoupled from their environment and as such can reach extremely long coherence times [1,2]; on the other hand, more macroscopic objects such as superconducting circuits are strongly coupled to electromagnetic fields, making them easy to entangle [3,4] although with shorter coherence times [5,6]. It thus seems appealing to combine the two types of systems in hybrid structures that could possibly take the best of both worlds. Here we report the first experimental realization of a hybrid quantum circuit in which a superconducting qubit of the transmon type [5,7] is coherently coupled to a spin ensemble consisting of nitrogen-vacancy (NV) centers in a diamond crystal [8] via a frequency-tunable superconducting resonator [9] acting as a quantum bus. Using this circuit, we prepare arbitrary superpositions of the qubit states that we store into collective excitations of the spin ensemble and retrieve back later on into the qubit. We demonstrate that this process preserves quantum coherence by performing quantum state tomography of the qubit. These results constitute a first proof of concept of spin-ensemble based quantum memory for superconducting qubits [10][11][12]. As a landmark of the successful marriage between a superconducting qubit and electronic spins, we detect with the qubit the hyperfine structure of the NV center.Superconducting qubits have been successfully coupled to electromagnetic [13] as well as mechanical [14] resonators; but coupling them to microscopic systems in a controlled way has up to now remained an elusive perspective -even though qubits sometimes turn out to be coupled to unknown and uncontrolled microscopic degrees of freedom with relatively short coherence times [15]. Whereas the coupling constant g of one individual microscopic system to a superconducting circuit is usually too weak for quantum information applications, ensembles of N such systems are coupled with a constant g √ N enhanced by collective effects.This makes possible to reach a regime of strong coupling between one collective variable of the ensemble and the circuit. This collective variable, which behaves in the low excitation limit as a harmonic oscillator, has been proposed [10-12] as a quantum memory for storing the state of superconducting qubits. Experimentally, the strong coupling between an ensemble of electronic spins and a superconducting resonator has been demonstrated 2 spectroscopically [16][17][18], and the storage of a microwave field into collective excitations of a spin ensemble has been observed very recently [19,20]. These experiments were however carried out in a classical regime since the resonator and spin ensemble behaved as two coupled harmonic oscillators driven by large microwave fields. In the perspective of building a quantum memory, it is instead necessary to perform experiments at the level of a...

Recent progress in nanotechnology has allowed to fabricate new hybrid systems where a single two-level system is coupled to a mechanical nanoresonator [1][2][3][4][5][6]. In such systems the quantum nature of a macroscopic degree of freedom can be revealed and manipulated. This opens up appealing perspectives for quantum information technologies [7], and for the exploration of quantum-classical boundary. Here we present the experimental realization of a monolithic solid-state hybrid system governed by material strain [8] : a quantum dot is embedded within a nanowire featuring discrete mechanical resonances corresponding to flexural vibration modes. Mechanical vibrations result in a time-varying strain field that modulates the quantum dot transition energy. This approach simultaneously offers a large light extraction efficiency [9,10] and a large exciton-phonon coupling strength g 0 . By means of optical and mechanical spectroscopy, we find that g 0 /2π is nearly as large as the mechanical frequency, a criterion which defines the ultrastrong coupling regime [12]. A single quantum two-level system coupled to a micron-size mechanical oscillator constitutes a hybrid system, which connects two different worlds: the classical and the quantum one. This new kind of interaction opens up the possibility of creating macroscopic non-classical states of motion, such as phonon Schrödinger cats or phonon number states. In the case of strain-mediated coupling, it is predicted that the two level system can even be used to cool the mechanical resonator down to its ground state [8] or conversely to achieve phonon lasing [13].Such appealing prospects have recently motivated the development of several kinds of hybrid systems, like for instance: (i) a single spin embedded in a mechanical resonator coupled together by an external magnetic field gradient [4,14,15], (ii) a few elementary charges (single electron or Cooper pair) coupled by electrostatic forces with a vibrating gate [2, 6, 16], or (iii) quantized current loops in superconducting qubits attached to a mechanical oscillator interacting via a magnetic field [17]. However, despite theoretical proposals highlighting the potential of using material strain to mediate a large coupling between Figure 1. Hybrid system and experimental setup. a Scanning electron microscope picture of a representative cone shaped nanowire. The quantum dots (QDs) layer is materialized by the dashed white line. b and c, Nanowire deformation in the first order flexural vibration mode. The stress field is plotted in blue to red color scale: due to its excentric inplane position, the quantum dot (yellow triangle) experiences in b a compressive strain that shifts its transition energy ω0 by + δω and in c a tensile strain that shifts its transition energy by − δω. d Experimental setup: single QD optical measurements are carried out using a spectrometer, and the measurement of the nanowire free-end displacement δx is realized by means of a balanced split photo-diode (SPD). The voltage difference v between th...

We have measured the complete Wigner function W of the vacuum and of a single-photon state for a field stored in a high-Q cavity. This experiment implements the direct Lutterbach and Davidovich method [L. G. Lutterbach and L. Davidovich, Phys. Rev. Lett. 78, 2547 (1997)]] and is based on the dispersive interaction of a single circular Rydberg atom with the cavity field. The nonclassical nature of the single-photon field is exhibited by a region of negative W values. Extensions to other nonclassical cavity field states are discussed.

This article sets up a new formalism to investigate stochastic thermodynamics in the quantum regime, where stochasticity and irreversibility primarily come from quantum measurement. In the absence of any bath, we define a purely quantum component to heat exchange, that corresponds to energy fluctuations caused by measurement back-action. Energetic and entropic signatures of measurement induced irreversibility are then investigated for canonical experiments of quantum optics, and the energetic cost of counter-acting decoherence is characterized on a simple state-stabilizing protocol. By placing quantum measurement in a central position, our formalism contributes to bridge a gap between experimental quantum optics and quantum thermodynamics

To illustrate the quantum mechanical principle of complementarity, Bohr described an interferometer with a microscopic slit that records the particle's path. Recoil of the quantum slit causes it to become entangled with the particle, resulting in a kind of Einstein-Podolsky-Rosen pair. As the motion of the slit can be observed, the ambiguity of the particle's trajectory is lifted, suppressing interference effects. In contrast, the state of a sufficiently massive slit does not depend on the particle's path; hence, interference fringes are visible. Although many experiments illustrating various aspects of complementarity have been proposed and realized, none has addressed the quantum-classical limit in the design of the interferometer. Here we report an experimental investigation of complementarity using an interferometer in which the properties of one of the beam-splitting elements can be tuned continuously from being effectively microscopic to macroscopic. Following a recent proposal, we use an atomic double-pulse Ramsey interferometer, in which microwave pulses act as beam-splitters for the quantum states of the atoms. One of the pulses is a coherent field stored in a cavity, comprising a small, adjustable mean photon number. The visibility of the interference fringes in the final atomic state probability increases with this photon number, illustrating the quantum to classical transition.