Quantum Technologies That Reject Thermal Noise for Improved SNR in Coherent-State Ranging and Related Applications

Abstract

We investigate a few techniques to improve the signal-to-noise-ratio (SNR) of range finding, sensing, and other light-detection applications. First technique filters out low photon numbers using photon-number-resolving detectors (PNRDs). This technique has no classical analog and cannot be done with classical detectors. Then, we use quantum hypothesis testing a tool of quantum information theory to show this detection is optimal, for an unknown coherent-state return signal. It is done by deriving the limits of symmetric and asymmetric error probabilities and showing that this detection saturates those quantum limits. Finally, we show that a coherent state is the optimal probe in the sense that adding squeezing, single-mode and two-mode, does not improve the performance. In particular, quantum illumination does not outperform laser range finding when the phase is unusable. In addition, we checked other techniques; correlation functions and machine learning. Using first-order correlation function, a factor of 2 improvement is obtained, which by repeating N times can be 2N. Unfortunately, Higher order correlation functions don't present any improvement. Moreover, a machine learning code is used, but could not provide the same performance of optimal detection.

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Document Details

Document Type
Technical Report
Publication Date
Aug 29, 2022
Accession Number
AD1180634

Entities

People

  • Jonathan Dowling

Organizations

  • Louisiana State University System

Tags

Communities of Interest

  • Advanced Electronics

DTIC Thesaurus Topics

  • Air Force Research Laboratories
  • Detection
  • Detectors
  • Information Processing
  • Information Theory
  • Interferometers
  • Lidar
  • Light Sources
  • Machine Learning
  • Measurement
  • Neural Networks
  • Optics
  • Probability
  • Probability Distributions
  • Quantum Information
  • Quantum Information Science
  • Quantum Mechanics
  • Range Finding
  • Societies
  • Statistics

Fields of Study

  • Physics

Readers

  • Calculus or Mathematical Analysis
  • Optical Physics and Photonics.
  • Radio communications and signal processing.

Technology Areas

  • AI & ML
  • AI & ML - Machine Learning Algorithms
  • Directed Energy
  • Quantum Computing