Quadrature squeezing in a nanophotonic microresonator

Abstract

Squeezed states of light are essential for emerging quantum technology in metrology and information processing. Chip-integrated photonics offers a route to scalable and efficient squeezed light generation, however, parasitic nonlinear processes and optical losses remain significant challenges. Here, we demonstrate single-mode quadrature squeezing in a photonic crystal microresonator via degenerate dual-pump spontaneous four-wave mixing. Implemented in a scalable, low-loss silicon-nitride photonic-chip platform, the microresonator features a tailored nano-corrugation that modifies its resonances to suppress parasitic nonlinear processes. In this way, we achieve an estimated 7.8 dB of on-chip squeezing in the bus waveguide, with potential for further improvement. These results open a promising pathway toward integrated squeezed light sources for quantum-enhanced interferometry, Gaussian boson sampling, coherent Ising machines, and universal quantum computing.