Fourth-Order Spatial Correlation of Thermal Light

We investigate the fourth-order spatial correlation properties of pseudo-thermal light in the photon counting regime, and apply the Klyshko advanced-wave picture to describe the process of four-photon coincidence counting measurement. We deduce the theory of a proof-of-principle four-photon coincide...

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Bibliographic Details
Published inChinese physics letters Vol. 31; no. 11; pp. 85 - 89
Main Author 问峰 张荀 薛鑫鑫 孙佳 宋建平 张彦鹏
Format Journal Article
LanguageEnglish
Published 01.11.2014
Subjects
Correlation
Correlation analysis
Decomposition
Imaging
Interference
Photons
Pictures
Visibility
光子计数
四阶
相关属性
相关峰
空间相关函数
空间相关性
能见度
辐射区
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Summary:We investigate the fourth-order spatial correlation properties of pseudo-thermal light in the photon counting regime, and apply the Klyshko advanced-wave picture to describe the process of four-photon coincidence counting measurement. We deduce the theory of a proof-of-principle four-photon coincidence counting configuration, and find that if the four randomly radiated photons come from the same radiation area and are indistinguishable in principle, the fourth-order correlation of them is 24 times larger than that when four photons come from different radiation areas. In addition, we also show that the higher-order spatial correlation function can be decomposed into multiple lower-order correlation functions, and the contrast and visibility of low-order correlation peaks are less than those of higher orders, while the resolutions all are identical. This study may be useful for better understanding the four-photon interference and multi-channel correlation imaging.
Bibliography:11-1959/O4
We investigate the fourth-order spatial correlation properties of pseudo-thermal light in the photon counting regime, and apply the Klyshko advanced-wave picture to describe the process of four-photon coincidence counting measurement. We deduce the theory of a proof-of-principle four-photon coincidence counting configuration, and find that if the four randomly radiated photons come from the same radiation area and are indistinguishable in principle, the fourth-order correlation of them is 24 times larger than that when four photons come from different radiation areas. In addition, we also show that the higher-order spatial correlation function can be decomposed into multiple lower-order correlation functions, and the contrast and visibility of low-order correlation peaks are less than those of higher orders, while the resolutions all are identical. This study may be useful for better understanding the four-photon interference and multi-channel correlation imaging.
WEN Feng, ZHANG Xun, XUE Xin-Xin, SUN Jia, SONG Jian-Ping, ZHANG Yan-Peng（ 1.Key Laboratory for Physical Electronics and Devices of the Ministry of Education, and Shaanxi Key Lab of Information Photonic Technique, Xi＇an Jiaotong University, Xi＇an 710049;2 .Huawei Technologies Co., Ltd. Bantian, Longgang District, Shenzhen 518129）
ObjectType-Article-1
SourceType-Scholarly Journals-1
ObjectType-Feature-2
content type line 23
ISSN:0256-307X
1741-3540
DOI:10.1088/0256-307X/31/11/114209