Perfect polarization for arbitrary light beams

Abstract

Polarization of light is harnessed in an abundance of classical and quantum applications. Characterizing polarization in a classical sense is done resoundingly successfully using the Stokes parameters, and numerous proposals offer new quantum counterparts of this characterization. The latter often rely on distance measures from completely polarized or unpolarized light. We here show that the accepted class of perfectly polarized quantum states of light is severely lacking in terms of both pure states and mixed states. By appealing to symmetry and geometry arguments we determine all of the states corresponding to perfect polarization, and show that the accepted class of completely polarized quantum states is only a subset of our result. We use this result to reinterpret the canonical degree of polarization, commenting on its interpretation for classical and quantum light. Our results are necessary for any further characterizations of light's polarization.

Fixed mistake in commutation relations

References in corpus (6)

• Multiqubit symmetric states with high geometric entanglement
• Quantum degrees of polarization
• Distance-based degrees of polarization for a quantum field
• Which multiphoton states are related via linear optics?
• Degree of Polarization in Quantum Optics through second generalization of Intensity
• Majorization of quantum polarization distributions

Cited by in corpus (8)

• Quantum-limited Euler angle measurements using anticoherent states
• Quantum theory of polarimetry: From quantum operations to Mueller matrices
• Quantum Polarimetry
• Nonclassical states that generate zero entanglement with a beam splitter
• Evidence-based certification of quantum dimensions
• Interplay between polarization and quantum correlations of confined polaritons
• Modification of polarization through de-Gaussification
• Majorana stellar representation for mixed-spin $(s,\frac{1}{2})$ systems