A thin film lithium niobate near-infrared platform for multiplexing quantum nodes.

Practical quantum networks will require multi-qubit quantum nodes. This in turn will increase the complexity of the photonic circuits needed to control each qubit and require strategies to multiplex memories. Integrated photonics operating at visible to near-infrared (VNIR) wavelength range can provide solutions to these needs.

Sub-1 Volt and high-bandwidth visible to near-infrared electro-optic modulators.

Integrated electro-optic (EO) modulators are fundamental photonics components with utility in domains ranging from digital communications to quantum information processing. At telecommunication wavelengths, thin-film lithium niobate modulators exhibit state-of-the-art performance in voltage-length product (VL), optical loss, and EO bandwidth. However, applications in optical imaging, optogenetics, and quantum science generally require devices operating in the visible-to-near-infrared (VNIR) wavelength range.

Landau-damping-induced limits to light-matter interactions in sub-10-nm planar plasmonic nanocavities.

Landau damping has previously been shown to be the dominant nonlocal effect in sub-10nm plasmonic nanostructures, although its effects on the performance of plasmonic nanocavities are still poorly understood. In this work, the effects of Landau damping in sub-10-nm planar plasmonic nanocavities are analyzed theoretically, and it is shown that while Landau damping does not affect the confinement of the cavity modes, it decreases the quality factor 10-fold due to the introduction of extra loss for sub-10nm gap sizes. As compared to purely classical models, this results in a suppression in the Purcell factor by 10 fold, the spontaneous emission rate by almost two orders of magnitude, and the required oscillator strength to achieve strong light-matter coupling by two orders of magnitude as the gap is reduced to ∼0.

Quantum Tunneling Induced Optical Rectification and Plasmon-Enhanced Photocurrent in Nanocavity Molecular Junctions.

Molecular junctions offer the opportunity for downscaling optoelectronic devices. Separating two electrodes with a single layer of molecules accesses the quantum-tunneling regime at low voltages (<1 V), where tunneling currents become highly sensitive to local nanometer-scale geometric features of the electrodes. These features generate asymmetries in the electrical response of the junction which combine with the incident oscillating optical fields to produce optical rectification and photocurrents.

High-performance flexible metal-on-silicon thermocouple.

We have demonstrated metal-on-silicon thermocouples with a noticeably high Seebeck coefficient and an excellent temperature-sensing resolution. Fabrication of the thermocouples involved only simple photolithography and metal-liftoff procedures on a silicon substrate. The experimentally measured Seebeck coefficient of our thermocouple was 9.