Skip to main content

Thank you for visiting nature.com. You are using a browser version with limited support for CSS. To obtain the best experience, we recommend you use a more up to date browser (or turn off compatibility mode in Internet Explorer). In the meantime, to ensure continued support, we are displaying the site without styles and JavaScript.

Quantum optics

Phase anomaly brings quantum implications

Nature Photonics volume 16, pages 815–817 (2022)Cite this article

Subjects

Experimental confirmation that the Gouy phase can modify the photonic de Broglie wavelength opens up many exciting directions in metrology using quantum systems with higher-order Gaussian modes.

In 1905, to explain the photoelectric effect, Albert Einstein postulated that light sometimes behaves like individual particles rather than a wave. The discovery of these quanta of light — which became known as photons — earned him the Nobel Prize. Roughly two decades later, Louis de Broglie took the concept of wave–particle duality further and postulated that it is not only important for photons, but for all particles. For that, he introduced an effective wavelength — now called the de Broglie wavelength — that describes the quantum behaviour of general quantum systems. Commenting on de Broglie’s radical idea, Einstein remarked that “he has lifted a corner of the great veil” — and indeed this insight was critical for Erwin Schrödinger’s discovery of his famous wave equation for describing the wave function of quantum mechanical systems.

This is a preview of subscription content, access via your institution

Access options

Buy article

Get time limited or full article access on ReadCube.

$32.00

Buy

All prices are NET prices.

Fig. 1: The classical and quantum Gouy phase.

References

  1. Jacobson, J., Björk, G., Chuang, I. & Yamamoto, Y. Phys. Rev. Lett. 74, 4835–4838 (1995).

    Article  ADS  Google Scholar 

  2. Mitchell, M. W., Lundeen, J. S. & Steinberg, A. M. Nature 429, 161–164 (2004).

    Article  ADS  Google Scholar 

  3. Walther, P. et al. Nature 429, 158–161 (2004).

    Article  ADS  Google Scholar 

  4. Polino, E., Valeri, M., Spagnolo, N. & Sciarrino, F. AVS Quantum Sci. 2, 024703 (2020).

    Article  ADS  Google Scholar 

  5. Hiekkamäki, M., Barros, R. F., Ornigotti, M. & Fickler, R. Nat. Photon. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41566-022-01077-w (2022).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  6. Simon, R. & Mukunda, N. Phys. Rev. Lett. 70, 880–883 (1993).

    Article  ADS  MathSciNet  Google Scholar 

  7. Subbarao, D. Opt. Lett. 20, 2162–2164 (1995).

    Article  ADS  Google Scholar 

  8. Feng, S. & Winful, H. G. Opt. Lett. 26, 485–487 (2001).

    Article  ADS  Google Scholar 

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Max Planck Institute for the Science of Light, Erlangen, Germany

    Xuemei Gu & Mario Krenn

Authors
  1. Xuemei Gu
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  2. Mario Krenn
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Xuemei Gu.

Ethics declarations

Competing interests

The authors declare no competing interests.

Rights and permissions

Reprints and Permissions

About this article

Verify currency and authenticity via CrossMark

Cite this article

Gu, X., Krenn, M. Phase anomaly brings quantum implications. Nat. Photon. 16, 815–817 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41566-022-01118-4

Download citation

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41566-022-01118-4

Search

Advanced search

Quick links

Nature Briefing

Sign up for the Nature Briefing newsletter — what matters in science, free to your inbox daily.

Get the most important science stories of the day, free in your inbox. Sign up for Nature Briefing