Observation of scalable sub-Poissonian-field lasing in a microlaser

Area of Science:

• Quantum Optics
• Cavity Quantum Electrodynamics
• Precision Measurement

Background:

• Sub-Poisson light sources with reduced photon number fluctuations are crucial for advancing quantum precision measurements.
• Previous methods utilizing strong atom-cavity coupling generated sub-Poisson fields but struggled with macroscopic photon numbers and significant variance reduction.
• Achieving macroscopic optical fields with variance below the standard quantum limit has remained a significant challenge.

Purpose of the Study:

• To demonstrate sub-Poisson field lasing in a microlaser with a macroscopic number of atoms.
• To achieve significant variance reduction below the standard quantum limit for intracavity photons.
• To explore the scalability of near-Fock-state light generation at the macroscopic level.

Main Methods:

• Development of a microlaser system with hundreds of atoms.
• Precise regulation of atom-cavity coupling and interaction time.
• Measurement of photon-number variance and intracavity mean photon number.

Main Results:

• Demonstrated sub-Poisson field lasing with photon-number variance 4 dB below the standard quantum limit.
• Achieved scalable intracavity mean photon numbers up to 600.
• Confirmed that high sub-Poisson photon statistics are maintained despite the simultaneous interaction of numerous atoms.

Conclusions:

• The study presents a viable method for generating macroscopic, highly sub-Poisson light fields.
• This work establishes an effective pathway towards scalable near-Fock-state lasing.
• The findings pave the way for enhanced quantum precision measurements using macroscopic quantum light sources.