Quantum interferometry with binary-outcome measurements in the presence of phase diffusion

Abstract

Optimal measurement scheme with an efficient data processing is important in quantum-enhanced interferometry. Here we prove that for a general binary outcome measurement, the simplest data processing based on inverting the average signal can saturate the Cramér-Rao bound. This idea is illustrated by binary outcome homodyne detection, even-odd photon counting (i.e., parity detection), and zero-nonzero photon counting that have achieved super-resolved interferometric fringe and shot-noise limited sensitivity in coherent-light Mach-Zehnder interferometer. The roles of phase diffusion are investigated in these binary outcome measurements. We find that the diffusion degrades the fringe resolution and the achievable phase sensitivity. Our analytical results confirm that the zero-nonzero counting can produce a slightly better sensitivity than that of the parity detection, as demonstrated in a recent experiment.

7 pages, 5 figures; typing error are fixed; the published version

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Cited by in corpus (7)

• Quantum metrology with unitary parametrization processes
• Fisher information of a squeezed-state interferometer with a finite photon-number resolution
• Quantum metrology at level anti-crossing
• Data processing over single-port homodyne detection to realize super-resolution and super-sensitivity
• Ultimate phase estimation in a squeezed-state interferometer using photon counters with a finite number resolution
• Multi-outcome homodyne detection in a coherent-state light interferometer
• Improvement of phase sensitivity in SU(1,1) interferometer via a Kerr nonlinear