Broadband detection of squeezed vacuum: A spectrum of quantum states

Gerd Breitenbach, Fabrizio Illuminati, Stephan Schiller, Jurgen Mlynek

Published 1999-01-15Version 1

We demonstrate the simultaneous quantum state reconstruction of the spectral modes of the light field emitted by a continuous wave degenerate optical parametric amplifier. The scheme is based on broadband measurement of the quantum fluctuations of the electric field quadratures and subsequent Fourier decomposition into spectral intervals. Applying the standard reconstruction algorithms to each bandwidth-limited quantum trajectory, a "spectrum" of density matrices and Wigner functions is obtained. The recorded states show a smooth transition from the squeezed vacuum to a vacuum state. In the time domain we evaluated the first order correlation function of the squeezed output field, showing good agreement with the theory.