arXiv subjects

Rivka Bekenstein

Publications and source records attributed to Rivka Bekenstein.

11 recordsLinked to original sources

arXiv2026

Collective emission of subwavelengths atom-like emitter arrays in the presence of inhomogeneous broadening

Quantum metasurfaces comprised of subwavelength atomic arrays emerged as a promising platform for enhanced atom-photon interaction. However, realizing such a system with solid-state emitters has been considered impractical due to strong inhomogeneous broadening, which was expected to suppress the photon-mediated interactions that underpin collective emission. Here we report the observation of collective emission from subwavelength arrays of silicon-vacancy centres in diamond -- solid-state emitters whose inhomogeneous broadening exceeds the natural linewidth by two orders of magnitude -- demonstrating that collective effects such as resonance shifts, modified decay rates and directional coherent emission survive this disorder. A crucial enabling element is the implantation of a high density of silicon ions at each array site. This creates so-called superatoms, local ensembles that probabilistically achieve frequency matching across the array and enhance the collective response. We support our observations with a theoretical analysis explaining the mechanisms that preserve the collective effects even in the presence of inhomogeneity. These observations have direct implications for the realization of subwavelength arrays in any solid-state system, paving the way for quantum-emitter metasurfaces that are naturally integrated into nanophotonic environments.

physics.optics↗

arXiv2025

Cluster States Generation with a Quantum Metasurface

We investigate the implementation of photonic cluster state generation protocols using quantum metasurfaces comprising sub-wavelength atomic arrays which enables quantum-controlled reflectivity. These cluster states are generated using fundamental quantum logic gates and enable wide-ranging applications in quantum computation and communication. In the past few years, certain protocols have been developed, but their physical realizations induces natural losses on the system mainly originated from coupling the photonic structures, setting a limit on the efficiency and maximal qubit number. In this paper, we examine a physical implementation of two specific protocols for generating distinct cluster states: a two-dimensional cluster state and a tree cluster state. Our approach leverages the unique properties of a quantum metasurface and its free space settings to implement two-qubit quantum-logic gates, namely CNOT, CZ, and E gates, with practical fidelities exceeding 0.9, and potential speed-up due to parallelism. In addition, we analyze these protocols fidelities for practical conditions of potential implementation experiments, such as thermal fluctuation of trapped atoms.

quant-ph↗

arXiv2025

Photon-Mediated Atomic Interactions in Curved Surface Settings

Subwavelength atomic lattices have emerged as a promising platform for quantum applications, leveraging collective superradiant and subradiant effects to enhance light-matter interactions. Integrating atomic lattices into nanostructures is at the front of effort toward any application with atomic lattices, but is still a challenging theoretical task, as the dipole interactions are hard to model in arbitrary dielectric environment. Here, we develop a formalism that allows the embedding of emitters to a wide class of thin curved waveguides, by greatly simplifying the wave equation and consequentially the dipole interactions. We demonstrate the formalism for locally constant positive curved surfaces, where we derive a new surface Green function that allows exact computation of the collective superradiant and subradiant states. We also show how the curvature and the thickness of the waveguides affects the collective states through an effective surface wavelength.

quant-ph↗

arXiv2025

Quantum metasurfaces as probes of vacuum particle content

The quantum vacuum of the electromagnetic field is inherently entangled across distinct spatial sub-regions, resulting in entangled particle content across these sub-regions. However accessing this particle content in a controlled laboratory experiment has remained out of experimental reach. Here, we analyse the feasibility of witnessing such vacuum effects with highly non-perturbative boundary condition changes with a quantum metasurface made from a two-dimensional sub-wavelength atomic array. The array response to light is tunable between transmissive and reflective states by a control atom that is excited to a Rydberg state. We find that vacuum photon content from non-perturbative changes of the boundary conditions and therefore distinct spatial sub-regions of the vacuum causes subtle frequency shifts and analyse the accessibility to sub-wavelength atom array platforms. This novel approach to probing vacuum particle content leverages the unique ability to generate coherent dynamics in superpositions of transmissive and reflective states of the array reflectivity, providing a quantum-enhanced platform for observing vacuum particle creation driven by highly non-perturbative changes in the boundary conditions of the electromagnetic vacuum.

quant-ph↗

arXiv2023

Beam steering at the nanosecond time scale with an atomically thin reflector

Techniques to mold the flow of light on subwavelength scales enable fundamentally new optical systems and device applications. The realization of programmable, active optical systems with fast, tunable components is among the outstanding challenges in the field. Here, we experimentally demonstrate a few-pixel beam steering device based on electrostatic gate control of excitons in an atomically thin semiconductor with strong light-matter interactions. By combining the high reflectivity of a MoSe2 monolayer with a graphene split-gate geometry, we shape the wavefront phase profile to achieve continuously tunable beam deflection with a range of 10$^\circ$, two-dimensional beam steering, and switching times down to 1.6 nanoseconds. Our approach opens the door for a new class of atomically thin optical systems, such as rapidly switchable beam arrays and quantum metasurfaces operating at their fundamental thickness limit.

cond-mat.mes-hall↗

arXiv2022

Efficient Source of Shaped Single Photons Based on an Integrated Diamond Nanophotonic System

An efficient, scalable source of shaped single photons that can be directly integrated with optical fiber networks and quantum memories is at the heart of many protocols in quantum information science. We demonstrate a deterministic source of arbitrarily temporally shaped single-photon pulses with high efficiency (detection efficiency = 14.9%) and purity ($g^{(2)}(0) = 0.0168$) and streams of up to 11 consecutively detected single photons using a silicon-vacancy center in a highly directional fiber-integrated diamond nanophotonic cavity. Combined with previously demonstrated spin-photon entangling gates, this system enables on-demand generation of streams of correlated photons such as cluster states and could be used as a resource for robust transmission and processing of quantum information.

quant-ph↗

arXiv2021

Optical Entanglement of Distinguishable Quantum Emitters

Solid-state quantum emitters are promising candidates for the realization of quantum networks, owing to their long-lived spin memories, high-fidelity local operations, and optical connectivity for long-range entanglement. However, due to differences in local environment, solid-state emitters typically feature a range of distinct transition frequencies, which makes it challenging to create optically mediated entanglement between arbitrary emitter pairs. We propose and demonstrate an efficient method for entangling emitters with optical transitions separated by many linewidths. In our approach, electro-optic modulators enable a single photon to herald a parity measurement on a pair of spin qubits. We experimentally demonstrate the protocol using two silicon-vacancy center sin a diamond nanophotonic cavity, with optical transitions separated by 7.4 GHz. Working with distinguishable emitters allows for individual qubit addressing and readout, enabling parallel control and entanglement of both co-located and spatially separated emitters, a key step towards scaling up quantum information processing systems

quant-ph↗

arXiv2019

Quantum Metasurfaces

Metasurfaces mold the flow of classical light waves by engineering sub-wavelength patterns from dielectric or metallic thin films. We describe and analyze a method in which quantum operator-valued reflectivity can be used to control both spatio-temporal and quantum properties of transmitted and reflected light. Such a quantum metasurface is realized by preparing and manipulating entangled superposition states of atomically thin reflectors. Specifically, we show that such a system allows for massively parallel quantum operations between atoms and photons and for the generation of highly non-classical states of light, including photonic GHZ and cluster states suitable for quantum information processing. We analyze the influence of imperfections and decoherence, as well as specific implementations based on atom arrays excited into Rydberg states. Finally, the extension to quantum metamaterials and emulations of quantum gravitational background for light are discussed.

quant-ph↗

arXiv2018

Observation of Accelerating Wave Packets in Curved Space

We present the first experimental observation of accelerating beams in curved space. More specifically, we demonstrate, experimentally and theoretically, shape-preserving accelerating beams propagating on spherical surfaces: closed-form solutions of the wave equation manifesting nongeodesic self-similar evolution. Unlike accelerating beams in flat space, these wave packets change their acceleration trajectory due to the interplay between interference effects and the space curvature, and they focus and defocus periodically due to the spatial curvature of the medium in which they propagate.

physics.optics↗

arXiv2013

Shape-Preserving Accelerating Electromagnetic Wavepackets in Curved Space

We present shape-preserving spatially accelerating electromagnetic wavepackets in curved space: wavepackets propagating along non-geodesic trajectories while recovering their structure periodically. These wavepackets are solutions to the paraxial and non-paraxial wave equation in curved space. We analyze the dynamics of such beams propagating on surfaces of revolution, and find solutions that carry finite power. These solutions propagate along a variety of non-geodesic trajectories, reflecting the interplay between the curvature of space and interference effects, with their intensity profile becoming narrower (or broader) in a scaled self-similar fashion Finally, we extend this concept to nonlinear accelerating beams in curved space supported by the Kerr nonlinearity. Our study concentrates on optical settings, but the underlying concepts directly relate to General Relativity.

physics.optics↗

arXiv2012

Non-Paraxial Accelerating Beams

We present the spatially accelerating solutions of the Maxwell equations. Such non-paraxial beams accelerate in a circular trajectory, thus generalizing the concept of Airy beams. For both TE and TM polarizations, the beams exhibit shape-preserving bending with sub-wavelength features, and the Poynting vector of the main lobe displays a turn of more than 90 degrees. We show that these accelerating beams are self-healing, analyze their properties, and compare to the paraxial Airy beams. Finally, we present the new family of periodic accelerating beams which can be constructed from our solutions.

physics.optics↗