Simple and efficient way to generate superbunching pseudothermal light

By modulating the intensity of laser light before rotating groundglass, the well-known pseudothermal light source can be modified into superbunching pseudothermal light source, in which the degree of second-order coherence of scattered light is larger than 2. With the modulated intensities following binary distribution, we experimentally observed the degree of second-and third-order coherence equaling 20.45 and 227.07, which is much larger than the value of thermal or pseudothermal light, 2 and 6, respectively. Numerical simulation predicts that the degree of second-order coherence can be further improved by tuning the parameters of binary distribution. It is also predicted that the quality of temporal ghost imaging can be improved with this type of superbunching pseudothermal light. This simple and efficient superbunching pseudothermal light source provides an interesting alternative to study the second-and higher-order interference of light in these scenarios where thermal or pseudothermal light source were employed.

Automated summary

The study investigates the modification of pseudothermal light source into superbunching pseudothermal light source by modulating the intensity of laser light. Experimental results and numerical simulations show that the second and third-order coherence of scattered light can be significantly improved with this type of light source. Numerical predictions also suggest that the degree of second-order coherence can be further enhanced by adjusting the parameters of binary distribution.