Highly efficient, tunable single photon source based on single molecules

The authors studied spatially isolated terrylene molecules immobilized in a quasiplanar optical λ∕2-microresonator using confocal microscopy and spectroscopy at variable temperatures. At T=1.8K, they observed individual molecules relaxing into microresonator-allowed vibronic levels of their electronic ground state by emission of single fluorescence photons. Coupling the purely electronic transition of embedded molecules to the longitudinal photonic mode of the microresonator resulted in an ultimate spectral narrowing and an increased collection efficiency of the emitted single photon wave trains.

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