Deterministic Control of Photon-Number Probabilities via Phase-Controlled Quantum Interference
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Abstract
Deterministically tailoring optical Fock states beyond the single-photon level is crucial for boson sampling, loss-tolerant photonic qubits, and quantum-enhanced sensing, however has yet remained elusive. Here, we report an all-linear-optical protocol that converts a resonantly driven single-photon emitter into a deterministic generator of vacuum--single-photon--two-photon states. A phase-stabilized, path-unbalanced Mach-Zehnder interferometer combines vacuum--single-photon interference and Hong-Ou-Mandel effect, providing two knobs to shape photon-number probabilities. By tuning these knobs, we observe a dynamic transition from antibunching to strong bunching in correlation measurements. A fully quantum-mechanical, discrete time-bin model maps these results onto the tailored photon statistics. The same framework predicts that two indistinguishable emitters would extend the accessible space to deterministic NOON states and single-photon filtering. This protocol relying on linear optics and available single-photon sources provides a scalable, chip-compatible, and platform-independent route to on-demand and deterministic few-photon resources for quantum metrology, photonic computing, as well as long-distance quantum networks.