Hardy's paradox tested in the spin-orbit Hilbert space of single photons

Ebrahim Karimi, Filippo Cardano, Maria Maffei, Corrado de Lisio, Lorenzo Marrucci, Robert W. Boyd, and Enrico Santamato
Phys. Rev. A 89, 032122 – Published 21 March 2014

Abstract

We test experimentally the quantum “paradox” proposed by L. Hardy [Phys. Rev. Lett. 71, 1665 (1993)] by using single photons instead of photon pairs. This is achieved by addressing two compatible degrees of freedom of the same particle, namely, its spin angular momentum, determined by the photon polarization, and its orbital angular momentum, a property related to the optical transverse mode. Because our experiment involves a single particle, we cannot use locality to logically enforce noncontextuality, which must therefore be assumed based only on the observables' compatibility. On the other hand, our single-particle experiment can be implemented more simply and allows larger detection efficiencies than typical two-particle ones, with a potential future advantage in terms of closing the detection loopholes.

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  • Received 22 January 2014

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevA.89.032122

©2014 American Physical Society

Authors & Affiliations

Ebrahim Karimi1,2,*, Filippo Cardano1, Maria Maffei1, Corrado de Lisio1, Lorenzo Marrucci1,3, Robert W. Boyd2, and Enrico Santamato1,4,†

  • 1Dipartimento di Fisica, Università di Napoli Federico II, Complesso di Monte S. Angelo, 80126 Napoli, Italy
  • 2Department of Physics, University of Ottawa, 150 Louis Pasteur, Ottawa, Ontario, Canada K1N 6N5
  • 3CNR-SPIN, Complesso di Monte S. Angelo, 80126 Napoli, Italy
  • 4Consorzio Nazionale Interuniversitario per le Scienze Fisiche della Materia, Napoli, Italy

  • *ekarimi@uottawa.ca
  • santamato@na.infn.it

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Vol. 89, Iss. 3 — March 2014

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