As soon as pairs of down-converted frequency photons are generated in a nonlinear crystal, the photons interact, individually, with the linear susceptibility formed by the electric dipoles in any dielectric medium. As a result, the quantum Rayleigh conversion of photons absorbs one photon and emits spontaneously another photon in a random direction and with a random state of polarization. However, the statistical results of the expectation values associated with entangled qubits of polarized photons are exactly reproduced with independent and individual qubits. The possibility of quantum non-locality properties being linked to entangled photons over long distances can easily be ruled out because of the immediate physical annihilation of the entangled photons propagating in a dielectric medium.
Despite multiple classical outcomes arising from the quantum Rayleigh conversions of photons underlying the propagation of optical waves through dielectric media and the ensuing light-matter interactions, this quantum process has been largely ignored. Several of its outcomes are considered in this article from a physical perspective, e.g., inter-quadrature coupling of photons, phase-dependent amplification in optical directional couplers and related polarization rotation, phase-shifting of weak signals in the optically linear regime, location-dependent coupling coefficient for refractive index gratings, etc. A correct identification of these effects will enable useful design and operation of integrated photonic functional devices.
The quantum Rayleigh spontaneous emission replaces entangled photons with independent ones in homogeneous dielectric media where single photons cannot propagate in a straight line. Single and independent groups of photons, described by the original bare states of Jaynes-Cummings model, deliver the correct expectation values for the number of photons carried by a photonic wavefront, its complex optical field, and phase quadratures. The intrinsic longitudinal field profile associated with a photonic wavefront is derived for any instantaneous number of photons. These photonic properties enable a step-by-step analysis of various beam splitters and interferometric filters. As a result, generalized expressions are derived for the correlation functions characterizing counting of coincident numbers of photons for fourth-order interference, whether classical or quantum optical, without entangled photons.
Polarization-based photonic quantum correlations can be traced back to the overlap of the polarization Stokes vectors on the Poincaré sphere between two polarization filters. Quantum-strong correlations can be obtained with independent polarization states on the Poincaré sphere. The quantum Rayleigh scattering prevents a single photon from propagating in a straight line inside a dielectric medium. The concept of quantum nonlocality is rather questionable because the quantum Rayleigh scattering in a dielectric medium destroys entangled photons.
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