We experimentally presented a full quantum detector tomography of a synchronously pumped infrared single-photon frequency upconversion detector. A maximum detection efficiency of 37.6% was achieved at the telecom wavelength of 1558 nm with a background noise about 1.0 × 10^-3 counts/pulse. The corresponding internal quantum conversion efficiency reached as high as 84.4%. The detector was then systematically characterized at different pump powers to investigate the quantum decoherence behavior. Here the reconstructed positive operator valued measure elements were equivalently illustrated with the Wigner function formalism, where the quantum feature of the detector is manifested by the presence of negative values of the Wigner function. In our experiment, pronounced negativities were attained due to the high detection efficiency and low background noise, explicitly showing the quantum feature of the detector. Such quantum detector could be useful in optical quantum state engineering, quantum information processing and communication.

We propose and experimentally demonstrate single-pixel photon counting imaging based on dual-comb interferometry at 1550 nm. Different from traditional dual-comb imaging, this approach enables imaging at the photon-counting regime by using single-photon detectors combined with a time-correlated single-photon counter to record the returning photons. The illumination power is as low as 14 pW, corresponding to 2.2 × 10−3 photons/pulse. The lateral resolution is about 50 μm. This technique paves the way for applying dual-comb in remote sensing and imaging.

We propose and demonstrate a high efficiency broadband near infrared single-photon upconversion and detection with a broadband pump laser based on sum frequency conversion in the PPLN crystal. By using a pump laser centered at 1040 nm with a spectral bandwidth of 10 nm, the signal single-photons centered at 1562 nm with a broadband bandwidth up to 7.2 nm are frequency-converted from the near infrared to the visible regime. A maximum conversion efficiency of 18.8% is achieved, while the background noise is measured to be only 1.2 × 10−3 counts/pulse. The corresponding spectral linewidth of the upconverted photons is 0.2 nm. This scheme of broadband infrared single-photon upconversion and detection provides potential solutions in infrared laser ranging, broadband infrared imaging and quantum key distribution.

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