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Updated: May 11, 2026

Measurement of Quantum Interference in a Silicon Ring Resonator Photon Source
Published on: April 4, 2017
Unequivocal differentiation of coherent and chaotic light through interferometric photon correlation measurements
A Lebreton1, I Abram, R Braive
1Laboratoire de Photonique et Nanostructures, LPN-CNRS UPR-20, Route de Nozay, 91460 Marcoussis, France.
Abstract:
We present a novel experimental technique that can differentiate unequivocally between chaotic light and coherent light with amplitude fluctuations, and thus permits us to characterize unambiguously the output of a laser. This technique consists of measuring the second-order intensity cross correlation at the outputs of an unbalanced Michelson interferometer. It is applied to a chaotic light source and to the output of a semiconductor nanolaser whose "standard" intensity correlation function above threshold displays values compatible with a mixture of coherent and chaotic light. Our experimental results demonstrate that the output of such lasers is not partially chaotic but is indeed a coherent state with amplitude fluctuations.
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