Abstract

Frequency upconversion for single photons at telecom wavelengths is important to simultaneously meet the different wavelength requirements for long-distance communications and quantum memories in a quantum nodal network. It also enables the detection for the telecom “flying qubit” photons with silicon-based efficient single-photon detectors with low dark count (DC) rates. Here, we demonstrate the frequency upconversion of attenuated single photons, using a low-loss titanium-indiffused periodically poled lithium niobate waveguide, pumped with a readily available erbium-doped fiber amplifier in the L-band. Internal and conversion efficiencies up to 84.4% and 49.9% have been achieved, respectively. The DC rates are suppressed down to 44 kHz at 13.9% end-to-end quantum efficiency (including full conversion and detection), enabled by our long-wavelength pump configuration and narrow 3.5-GHz bandpass filtering.

© 2019 Optical Society of America

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