title: Coherent perfect absorption in deeply subwavelength films in the single-photon regime.
abstract: The technologies of heating, photovoltaics, water photocatalysis and artificial photosynthesis depend on the absorption of light and novel approaches such as coherent absorption from a standing wave promise total dissipation of energy. Extending the control of absorption down to very low light levels and eventually to the single-photon regime is of great interest and yet remains largely unexplored. Here we demonstrate the coherent absorption of single photons in a deeply subwavelength 50% absorber. We show that while the absorption of photons from a travelling wave is probabilistic, standing wave absorption can be observed deterministically, with nearly unitary probability of coupling a photon into a mode of the material, for example, a localized plasmon when this is a metamaterial excited at the plasmon resonance. These results bring a better understanding of the coherent absorption process, which is of central importance for light harvesting, detection, sensing and photonic data processing applications.
authors.affiliation: Institute for Photonics and Quantum Sciences and SUPA, Heriot-Watt University, Edinburgh EH14 4AS, UK.
authors.forename: Thomas
authors.identifier: http://orcid.org/0000-0003-0862-4961
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Roger
authors.affiliation: Centre for Disruptive Photonic Technologies, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore 639798, Singapore.
authors.forename: Stefano
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Vezzoli
authors.affiliation: Institute for Photonics and Quantum Sciences and SUPA, Heriot-Watt University, Edinburgh EH14 4AS, UK.
authors.forename: Eliot
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Bolduc
authors.affiliation: Optoelectronics Research Centre &Centre for Photonic Metamaterials, University of Southampton, Southampton SO17 1BJ, UK.
authors.forename: Joao
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Valente
authors.affiliation: Institute for Photonics and Quantum Sciences and SUPA, Heriot-Watt University, Edinburgh EH14 4AS, UK.
authors.forename: Julius J F
authors.initials: JJF
authors.lastname: Heitz
authors.affiliation: Department of Physics, University of Strathclyde, Glasgow G1 1XQ, UK.
authors.forename: John
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Jeffers
authors.affiliation: Centre for Disruptive Photonic Technologies, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore 639798, Singapore.
authors.forename: Cesare
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Soci
authors.affiliation: Institute for Photonics and Quantum Sciences and SUPA, Heriot-Watt University, Edinburgh EH14 4AS, UK.
authors.forename: Jonathan
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Leach
authors.affiliation: Centre for Disruptive Photonic Technologies, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore 639798, Singapore.|CINTRA CNRS-NTU-Thales, UMI 3288, Singapore, Singapore.|Laboratory for Nanotechnology, Instrumentation and Optics, ICD CNRS UMR 6281, University of Technology of Troyes, Troyes, France.
authors.forename: Christophe
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Couteau
authors.affiliation: Centre for Disruptive Photonic Technologies, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore 639798, Singapore.|Optoelectronics Research Centre &Centre for Photonic Metamaterials, University of Southampton, Southampton SO17 1BJ, UK.
authors.forename: Nikolay I
authors.initials: NI
authors.lastname: Zheludev
authors.affiliation: Institute for Photonics and Quantum Sciences and SUPA, Heriot-Watt University, Edinburgh EH14 4AS, UK.
authors.forename: Daniele
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Faccio