Radiometric applications of correlated photon metrology

Many of the schemes utilizing photon states under investigation for Quantum Information Processing (QIP) technology involve active and passive optical components. In order to be able to establish fidelity levels for these schemes, the performance of these optical components and their coupling efficiencies require careful and accurate characterization. Correlated photons, the basis of entangled photon states, offer a direct means of measuring detector quantum efficiency and source radiance in the photon counting regime. Detector and source calibration by correlated photon techniques therefore address some of the key factors critical to QIP technology and the developing techniques of correlated/entangled photon metrology. Work is being undertaken at NPL to establish the accuracy limitations of the correlated photon technique for detector and source calibration. This paper will report on investigations concerning the characterization of silicon avalanche photodiode detectors using the correlated photon technique.