Single-photon terahertz (THz) detection is one of the most demanding technologies for a variety of fields and could lead to many breakthroughs. Although significant progress has been made in the past two decades, operating it at room temperature still remains a great challenge. Here, we demonstrate, for the first time, a room temperature THz detector at single-photon levels based on nonlinear wave mixing in thermal Rydberg atomic vapor. The low-energy THz photons are coherently upconverted to high-energy optical photons via a nondegenerate Rydberg state involved in a six-wave mixing process, and therefore, single-photon THz detection is achieved by a conventional optical single-photon counting module. The noise equivalent power of such a detector reaches 9.5 10−19 W/Hz1/2, which is more than four orders of magnitude lower than the state-of-the-art room temperature THz detectors. The optimum quantum efficiency of the whole-wave mixing process is about 4.3%, with 40.6 dB dynamic range, and the maximum conversion bandwidth is 172 MHz, which is all-optically controllable. The developed fast and continuous-wave single-photon THz detector at room temperature operation has a great potential for portability and chip-scale integration, and could be revolutionary for a wide range of applications in remote sensing, wireless communication, biomedical diagnostics, and quantum optics.
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Room temperature single-photon terahertz detection with thermal Rydberg atoms
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December 2024
Research Article|
November 08 2024
Room temperature single-photon terahertz detection with thermal Rydberg atoms

Danyang Li;
Danyang Li
(Data curation, Formal analysis)
1
State Key Laboratory of Precision Spectroscopy, Institute of Quantum Science and Precision Measurement, East China Normal University
, Shanghai 200062, China
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Zhengyang Bai
;
Zhengyang Bai
(Data curation, Formal analysis)
1
State Key Laboratory of Precision Spectroscopy, Institute of Quantum Science and Precision Measurement, East China Normal University
, Shanghai 200062, China
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Xiaoliang Zuo;
Xiaoliang Zuo
(Data curation, Formal analysis)
1
State Key Laboratory of Precision Spectroscopy, Institute of Quantum Science and Precision Measurement, East China Normal University
, Shanghai 200062, China
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Yuelong Wu;
Yuelong Wu
(Software)
1
State Key Laboratory of Precision Spectroscopy, Institute of Quantum Science and Precision Measurement, East China Normal University
, Shanghai 200062, China
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Jiteng Sheng
;
Jiteng Sheng
a)
(Conceptualization, Investigation, Project administration, Supervision, Validation, Visualization, Writing – original draft, Writing – review & editing)
1
State Key Laboratory of Precision Spectroscopy, Institute of Quantum Science and Precision Measurement, East China Normal University
, Shanghai 200062, China
a)Author to whom correspondence should be addressed: [email protected]
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Haibin Wu
Haibin Wu
b)
(Funding acquisition, Project administration, Supervision, Writing – review & editing)
1
State Key Laboratory of Precision Spectroscopy, Institute of Quantum Science and Precision Measurement, East China Normal University
, Shanghai 200062, China
2
Shanghai Branch, Hefei National Laboratory
, Shanghai 201315, China
3
Collaborative Innovation Center of Extreme Optics, Shanxi University
, Taiyuan 030006, China
4
Shanghai Research Center for Quantum Sciences
, Shanghai 201315, China
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a)Author to whom correspondence should be addressed: [email protected]
b)
Electronic mail: [email protected]
Appl. Phys. Rev. 11, 041420 (2024)
Article history
Received:
May 21 2024
Accepted:
September 23 2024
Connected Content
A companion article has been published:
Single-photon terahertz detectors without cryogenic conditions
Citation
Danyang Li, Zhengyang Bai, Xiaoliang Zuo, Yuelong Wu, Jiteng Sheng, Haibin Wu; Room temperature single-photon terahertz detection with thermal Rydberg atoms. Appl. Phys. Rev. 1 December 2024; 11 (4): 041420. https://doi.org/10.1063/5.0219879
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