Liquid crystal source of photon pairs opens path to new generation of quantum sources

https://phys.org/news/2024-06-liquid-crystal-source-photon-pairs.html

"a source of entangled photons, spontaneous parametric down-conversion, can now be implemented, besides in solids, in liquid ferroelectric nematic crystals featuring strong central symmetry breaking... molecules elongated, asymmetric, can be re-oriented by external electric field changing generated photon pair polarization as well as generation rate... highly efficient, flexible, tunable, can be implemented into more complex devices... applying few volts switches photon pairs on/ off, changes polarization"

Related: Scientists create ultracompact polarization-entangled photon sources for miniaturized quantum devices
https://phys.org/news/2024-08-scientists-ultracompact-polarization-entangled-photon.html