Title: Improved Spatial Resolution Achieved by Chromatic Intensity Interferometry

Journal Article · · Physical Review Letters
 [1];  [2]; ORCiD logo [3];  [4];  [2];  [5];  [5];  [3]; ORCiD logo [2];  [6];  [3]
  1. Univ. of Science and Technology, Hefei (China); Univ. of Science and Technology, Shanghai (China); Shanghai Research Center for Quantum Sciences (China); OSTI
  2. Univ. of Science and Technology, Hefei (China); Univ. of Science and Technology, Shanghai (China); Shanghai Research Center for Quantum Sciences (China); Jinan Institute of Quantum Technology (China)
  3. Univ. of Science and Technology, Hefei (China); Univ. of Science and Technology, Shanghai (China); Shanghai Research Center for Quantum Sciences (China)
  4. Harvard Univ., Cambridge, MA (United States)
  5. Jinan Institute of Quantum Technology (China)
  6. Massachusetts Inst. of Technology (MIT), Cambridge, MA (United States); Shanghai Jiao Tong Univ. (China); Stockholm Univ. (Sweden); Arizona State Univ., Tempe, AZ (United States)

Interferometers are widely used in imaging technologies to achieve enhanced spatial resolution, but require that the incoming photons be indistinguishable. In previous work, we built and analyzed color erasure detectors which expand the scope of intensity interferometry to accommodate sources of different colors. Here we demonstrate experimentally how color erasure detectors can achieve improved spatial resolution in an imaging task, well beyond the diffraction limit. Utilizing two 10.9 mm-aperture telescopes and a 0.8 m baseline, we measure the distance between a 1063.6 nm source and a 1064.4 nm source separated by 4.2 mm at a distance of 1.43 km, which surpasses the diffraction limit of a single telescope by about 40 times. Moreover, chromatic intensity interferometry allows us to recover the phase of the Fourier transform of the imaged objects – a quantity that is, in the presence of modest noise, inaccessible to conventional intensity interferometry.

Research Organization:
Massachusetts Inst. of Technology (MIT), Cambridge, MA (United States)
Sponsoring Organization:
Anhui Initiative in Quantum Information Technologies; Chinese Academy of Sciences; European Research Council; National Key R&D Program of China, National Natural Science Foundation of China; Shanghai Municipal Science and Technology Major Project; Swedish Research Council; USDOE Office of Science (SC)
Grant/Contract Number:
SC0012567
OSTI ID:
1851684
Journal Information:
Physical Review Letters, Journal Name: Physical Review Letters Journal Issue: 10 Vol. 127; ISSN 0031-9007; ISSN PRLTAO
Publisher:
American Physical Society (APS)Copyright Statement
Country of Publication:
United States
Language:
English

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  • Brown, R. Hanbury; Twiss, R. Q.
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