Measurement of geometric phase for mixed states using single photon interferometry

Effects of light-wave nonstaticity on accompanying geometric-phase evolutions

Quantum mechanics allows the emergence of nonstatic quantum light waves in the Fock state even in a transparent medium of which electromagnetic parameters do not vary over time. Such wave packets become broad and narrow in turn periodically in the quadrature space. We investigate the effects of wave nonstaticity arisen in a static environment on the behavior of accompanying geometric phases in the Fock states. In this case, the geometric phases appear only when the measure of nonstaticity is not zero and their time behavior is deeply related to the measure of nonstaticity. While the dynamical phases undergo linear decrease over time, the geometric phases exhibit somewhat oscillatory behavior where the center of oscillation increases linearly. In particular, if the measure of nonstaticity is sufficiently high, the geometric phases abruptly change whenever the waves become narrow in the quadrature space. The understanding for the phase evolution of nonstatic light waves is necessary in their technological applications regarding wave modulations.

Sub-Geometric Phases in Density Matrices

This study presents the generalization of geometric phases in density matrices. We show that the extended sub-geometric phase has an unified expression during the adiabatic or nonadiabatic process and establish the relations between them and the usual Berry or Aharonov-Anandan phases. We also demonstrate the influence of sub-geometric phases on the physical observables. Finally, the above treatment is used to investigate the geometric phase in a mixed state.

Geometric phase morphology of Jones matrices

We demonstrate an innovative technique based on the Pancharatnam-Berry phase that can be used to determine whether an optical system characterized by a Jones matrix is homogeneous or inhomogeneous, containing orthogonal or nonorthogonal eigenpolarizations, respectively. Homogeneous systems have a symmetric geometric phase morphology showing line dislocations and sets of polarization states with an equal geometric phase. In contrast, the morphology of inhomogeneous systems exhibits phase singularities, where the Pancharatnam-Berry phase is undetermined. The results show an alternative to extract polarization properties such as diattenuation and retardance, and can be used to study the transformation of space-variant polarized beams.

Observation of entanglement-dependent two-particle holonomic phase

Holonomic phases--geometric and topological--have long been an intriguing aspect of physics. They are ubiquitous, ranging from observations in particle physics to applications in fault tolerant quantum computing. However, their exploration in particles sharing genuine quantum correlations lacks in observations. Here, we experimentally demonstrate the holonomic phase of two entangled photons evolving locally, which, nevertheless, gives rise to an entanglement-dependent phase. We observe its transition from geometric to topological as the entanglement between the particles is tuned from zero to maximal, and find this phase to behave more resiliently to evolution changes with increasing entanglement. Furthermore, we theoretically show that holonomic phases can directly quantify the amount of quantum correlations between the two particles. Our results open up a new avenue for observations of holonomic phenomena in multiparticle entangled quantum systems.

Observation of quantum interference as a function of Berry's phase in a complex Hadamard optical network

Emerging models of quantum computation driven by multiphoton quantum interference, while not universal, may offer an exponential advantage over classical computers for certain problems. Implementing these circuits via geometric phase gates could mitigate requirements for error correction to achieve fault tolerance while retaining their relative physical simplicity. We report an experiment in which a geometric phase is embedded in an optical network with no closed loops, enabling quantum interference between two photons as a function of the phase.

Experimental demonstration of the stability of Berry's phase for a spin-1/2 particle

The geometric phase has been proposed as a candidate for noise resilient coherent manipulation of fragile quantum systems. Since it is determined only by the path of the quantum state, the presence of noise fluctuations affects the geometric phase in a different way than the dynamical phase. We have experimentally tested the robustness of Berry's geometric phase for spin-1/2 particles in a cyclically varying magnetic field. Using trapped polarized ultracold neutrons, it is demonstrated that the geometric phase contributions to dephasing due to adiabatic field fluctuations vanish for long evolution times.

Observation of nonadditive mixed-state phases with polarized neutrons

In a neutron polarimetry experiment the mixed-state relative phases between spin eigenstates are determined from the maxima and minima of measured intensity oscillations. We consider evolutions leading to purely geometric, purely dynamical, and combined phases. It is experimentally demonstrated that the sum of the individually determined geometric and dynamical phases is not equal to the associated total phase which is obtained from a single measurement, unless the system is in a pure state.

Scaling of geometric phases close to the quantum phase transition in the XY spin chain

We show that the geometric phase of the ground state in the XY model obeys scaling behavior in the vicinity of a quantum phase transition. In particular we find that the geometric phase is nonanalytical and its derivative with respect to the field strength diverges at the critical magnetic field. Furthermore, the universality in the critical properties of the geometric phase in a family of models is verified. In addition, since the quantum phase transition occurs at a level crossing or avoided level crossing and these level structures can be captured by the Berry curvature, the established relation between the geometric phase and quantum phase transitions is not a specific property of the XY model, but a very general result of many-body systems.

Remote state preparation: arbitrary remote control of photon polarization

We experimentally demonstrate the first remote state preparation of arbitrary single-qubit states, encoded in the polarization of photons generated by spontaneous parametric down-conversion. Utilizing degenerate and nondegenerate wavelength entangled sources, we remotely prepare arbitrary states at two wavelengths. Further, we derive theoretical bounds on the states that may be remotely prepared for given two-qubit resources.