Quantum-enhanced weak absorption estimation with correlated photons

Abstract: Conventional absorption spectroscopy relies on coherent laser sources, and in turn suffers from the inherent limitation of shot noise, especially in estimating weak absorption. Here we propose a measurement strategy with correlated photons to determine the weak absorption by distinguishing the output with and without photons, dubbed as the on-off measurement. We demonstrate that absorption spectroscopy that incorporates quantum correlations is capable of estimating weak absorption down to a single-photon level, even in noisy environments, achieving a precision comparable to that obtained through 1000 photons in conventional absorption spectroscopy. Our strategy provides a new method to probe fragile systems with weak absorption, avoiding the occurrence of light-induced damage.