Simultaneous generation of two spin-wave-photon entangled states in an atomic ensemble

Abstract

The generation and storage of entangled photons play important roles in quantum information technique. Spontaneous Raman scattering (SRS) in atomic ensembles provides a promising method to generate entangled photons capable of storage. In the past experiments, a spin-wave-photon entangled state is produced via SRS in an atomic ensemble, with which a pair of entangled photons is obtained. Here, we report a scheme of simultaneously generating two spin-wave-photon entangled states in an atomic ensemble by collecting Stokes photons at two different directions. Based on the obtained two atom-photon entangled sources, we generate a three-photon GHZ polarization-entangled state and conditionally prepare a polarization-entangled photon pair, respectively.