quantum-computing

Ghost imaging with zero photons

arXiv Quantum Physics

3 min read

0 likes

⚡ Quantum Brief

Researchers led by Jianbin Liu demonstrated "ghost imaging with zero photons," where images are reconstructed without any photons interacting with the object or reference beam. This breakthrough challenges conventional ghost imaging, which relies on correlated photon pairs. The experiment discards all photons that touch the object, using only time bins with zero photons to retrieve the image. This counterintuitive process exploits photon-number projection measurements and thermal light statistics. The technique resolves longstanding debates about ghost imaging’s underlying physics, clarifying the roles of quantum versus classical correlations. It suggests classical light can mimic quantum-like behavior under specific conditions. Unlike traditional ghost imaging—where one beam illuminates the object and another remains untouched—this method requires no photon detection from either beam, relying solely on statistical voids in photon streams. The findings bridge quantum and classical optics, offering new insights into correlation-based imaging and potential applications in low-light or non-invasive imaging systems.

Summarize this article with:

Quantum Physics arXiv:2604.07782 (quant-ph) [Submitted on 9 Apr 2026] Title:Ghost imaging with zero photons Authors:Meixue Chen, Yiqi Song, Yu Gu, Huafan Zhang, Huaibin Zheng, Yuchen He, Hui Chen, Yu Zhou, Fuli Li, Zhuo Xu, Jianbin Liu View a PDF of the paper titled Ghost imaging with zero photons, by Meixue Chen and 10 other authors View PDF HTML (experimental) Abstract:Ghost imaging was first demonstrated with entangled photon pairs and well-known for its peculiar properties. The signal beam that illuminates the object possesses no spatial resolution, whereas the reference beam, which never interacts with the object, is spatially resolved. Either beam alone cannot retrieve the image, which can only be obtained when the signal and reference beams are correlated. Here we will report a ghost imaging experiment with even more peculiar properties, in which the image can be reconstructed when no photon interacts with the object or even no photon in neither signal nor reference beam. All the photons interacted with the object are discarded. Only the time bins with zero photon are employed to retrieve the image, a process referred to as "ghost imaging with zero photons" hereafter. The reason why ghost image can be retrieved with zero photons is jointly determined by photon-number projection measurement and photon statistics of thermal light. The results are helpful to resolve the debate on the physics of ghost imaging and understand the relation between quantum and classical correlations. Comments: Subjects: Quantum Physics (quant-ph); Optics (physics.optics) Cite as: arXiv:2604.07782 [quant-ph] (or arXiv:2604.07782v1 [quant-ph] for this version) https://doi.org/10.48550/arXiv.2604.07782 Focus to learn more arXiv-issued DOI via DataCite (pending registration) Submission history From: Jianbin Liu [view email] [v1] Thu, 9 Apr 2026 04:17:35 UTC (8,468 KB) Full-text links: Access Paper: View a PDF of the paper titled Ghost imaging with zero photons, by Meixue Chen and 10 other authorsView PDFHTML (experimental)TeX Source view license Current browse context: quant-ph new | recent | 2026-04 Change to browse by: physics physics.optics References & Citations INSPIRE HEP NASA ADSGoogle Scholar Semantic Scholar export BibTeX citation Loading... BibTeX formatted citation × loading... Data provided by: Bookmark Bibliographic Tools Bibliographic and Citation Tools Bibliographic Explorer Toggle Bibliographic Explorer (What is the Explorer?) Connected Papers Toggle Connected Papers (What is Connected Papers?) Litmaps Toggle Litmaps (What is Litmaps?) scite.ai Toggle scite Smart Citations (What are Smart Citations?) Code, Data, Media Code, Data and Media Associated with this Article alphaXiv Toggle alphaXiv (What is alphaXiv?) Links to Code Toggle CatalyzeX Code Finder for Papers (What is CatalyzeX?) DagsHub Toggle DagsHub (What is DagsHub?) GotitPub Toggle Gotit.pub (What is GotitPub?) Huggingface Toggle Hugging Face (What is Huggingface?) ScienceCast Toggle ScienceCast (What is ScienceCast?) Demos Demos Replicate Toggle Replicate (What is Replicate?) Spaces Toggle Hugging Face Spaces (What is Spaces?) Spaces Toggle TXYZ.AI (What is TXYZ.AI?) Related Papers Recommenders and Search Tools Link to Influence Flower Influence Flower (What are Influence Flowers?) Core recommender toggle CORE Recommender (What is CORE?) Author Venue Institution Topic About arXivLabs arXivLabs: experimental projects with community collaborators arXivLabs is a framework that allows collaborators to develop and share new arXiv features directly on our website. Both individuals and organizations that work with arXivLabs have embraced and accepted our values of openness, community, excellence, and user data privacy. arXiv is committed to these values and only works with partners that adhere to them. Have an idea for a project that will add value for arXiv's community? Learn more about arXivLabs. Which authors of this paper are endorsers? | Disable MathJax (What is MathJax?)

Read Original

Source Information

Source: arXiv Quantum Physics

Website: https://arxiv.org/rss/quant-ph