• Accepted Paper

Measuring the complete set of spatial Schmidt modes of entangled two-photon fields

Radhika Prasad, Nilakshi Senapati, Abhinandan Bhattacharjee, Suman Karan, and Anand K. Jha

Phys. Rev. Applied - Accepted 23 September, 2026

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1103/rwmz-jp7r

Abstract

Updated Title: Measuring the complete set of spatial Schmidt modes of entangled two-photon fields Updated Abstract: Spontaneous parametric down-conversion (SPDC) is the most widely-used source of high-dimensional entangled two-photon states, and the entanglement in the spatial degree of freedom is considered best suited for harnessing high-dimensional advantages. Although the Schmidt basis provides a natural choice for state characterization of entangled two-photon states in any degree of freedom, the existing techniques can only reconstruct the Schmidt spectrum when the Schmidt basis is known a priori. There is currently no technique that can measure the unknown Schmidt basis of an entangled two-photon state. In this letter, we present a technique that measures the complete set of spatial Schmidt modes without any prior knowledge of the Schmidt basis, as long as the cross-spectral density functions corresponding to individual photons are of Schell-model type. Using this technique, we report measurement of states with over 3000 Schmidt modes–highest reported yet–with up to 98% fidelity. Our technique works even when the entangled field is very low-dimensional or entirely separable, as well as when the field pumping the SPDC is structured. We expect our work to significantly advance harnessing of spatial-entanglement.

Export citation

Export citation

Choose format for download:

Download Citation

If the author has provided any supplemental materials with this article they will be available upon publication of the version of record.

Sign In to Your Journals Account

Filter

Filter

Article Lookup

Enter a citation