Thorlabs launches high-performance photon source product

Thorlabs has announced it has entered into a commercial agreement to manufacture a correlated photon-pair source tool; pioneered by the research and development of start-up company, Raycal. The product works by using spontaneous parametric down-conversions, to create energy-time entangled photons, that in turn produce a high-brightness heralded single-photon source – that is ideal for quantum optics applications.

Founded in 2018, Raycal was founded by QTEC Fellow, Mateusz Piekarek and QuantIC researcher, Jonathan Mathews at the University of Bristol. The company provides consulting services in the area of quantum technologies, with special focus on imaging and metrology. It was the technical development supported by QuantIC, combined with the business skills fostered by the QTEC training programme at Bristol University that helped push forward the business model and eventual commercialisation of the high- performance Photon Source.

Dr Jonathan Matthews, Associate Professor in quantum technology at the University of Bristol, said: “It is rewarding to see a research tool, that we’ve traditionally had to re-build many times over for quantum optics experiments from scratch, become commercially available as a turn-key solution. I don’t think this would have happened without the support of QUANTIC and the QTEC training programme”