Polarization distribution and degree of polarization for three-dimensional quantum light fields

We introduce a probability distribution for polarization of three-dimensional quantum light fields as a marginal of the quadrature Q function for a three-mode field by removing the variables irrelevant for polarization (total intensity and global phased. The probability distribution turns out to be...

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Bibliographic Details
Author: Luis Aina, Alfredo
Format: article
Publication Date:2005
Country:España
Institution:Universidad Complutense de Madrid (UCM)
Repository:Docta Complutense
Language:English
OAI Identifier:oai:docta.ucm.es:20.500.14352/51501
Online Access:https://hdl.handle.net/20.500.14352/51501
Access Level:Open access
Keyword:535
Electromagnetic-wave polarization
Coherent states
Phase-space
Density-matrix
Quasiprobability distributions
Harmonic-oscillator
Spin states
Uncertainty
Operators
Localization
Óptica (Física)
2209.19 Óptica Física
Description
Summary:We introduce a probability distribution for polarization of three-dimensional quantum light fields as a marginal of the quadrature Q function for a three-mode field by removing the variables irrelevant for polarization (total intensity and global phased. The probability distribution turns out to be determined by projection on SU(3) coherent states. We introduce a degree of polarization as the distance between the polarization distribution and the uniform distribution associated with completely unpolarized light. We study the relation between two- and three-dimensional polarization by considering field states with a component in the vacuum state. We apply this formalism to some relevant field states.