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Planck Spectroscopy and Quantum Noise of Microwave Beam Splitters

Mon, 2011-02-14 20:18 - Daniel Rudolph
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Date: 
2010-09-20
Author(s): 

M. Mariantoni, E. P. Menzel, F. Deppe, M. A. Araque-Caballero, A. Baust, T. Niemczyk, E.
Hoffmann, E. Solano, A. Marx, and R. Gross

Reference: 

Phys. Rev. Lett. 105, 133601 (2010)

URL: 

http://link.aps.org/doi/10.1103/PhysRevLett.105.133601

We use a correlation function analysis of the field quadratures to characterize both the blackbody radiation emitted by a 50  Ω load resistor and the quantum properties of two types of beam splitters in the microwave regime. To this end, we first study vacuum fluctuations as a function of frequency in a Planck spectroscopy experiment and then measure the covariance matrix of weak thermal states. Our results provide direct experimental evidence that vacuum fluctuations represent the fundamental minimum quantum noise added by a beam splitter to any given input signal.