Towards Quantum Telescopes: Demonstration of a Two-Photon Interferometer for Quantum-Assisted Astronomy [IMA]

http://arxiv.org/abs/2301.07042


Optical Very-Long-Baseline Interferometers (VLBI), widely used in astronomy, require phase-stable optical links across stations, which impose a limit on baseline distances, and, in turn, limits measurement precision. Here we describe a novel type of two-photon quantum-assisted interferometer, which may allow improvements in precision by orders of magnitude benefiting numerous fields in cosmology and astrophysics. We tested a tabletop version of the interferometer and unambiguously observe correlated behavior in detections of photon pairs from two thermal light sources, in agreement with theoretical predictions. This work opens new possibilities in astronomical measurements.

Read this paper on arXiv…

J. Crawford, D. Dolzhenko, M. Keach, et. al.
Wed, 18 Jan 23
35/133

Comments: N/A