100 million photons per second from a single organic molecule
Abstract
At cryogenic temperatures, organic single-photon sources (SPSs) offer Fourier-limited emission, virtually unlimited photostability, and emission wavelengths selectable by molecular design, making them attractive for quantum metrology, secure communication, and photonic quantum information processing. However, their efficient integration with photonic microstructures has remained challenging, limiting photon collection from single organic emitters under cryogenic operation. Here, we demonstrate a cryogenic planar metallo-dielectric antenna that efficiently directs the emission of a single dibenzoterrylene (DBT) molecule towards the collection optics. The device reaches a collection efficiency of 97% and delivers 100 million photons per second into the first lens. We measure a photon indistinguishability for the Fourier-limited transition of 91.2% while maintaining a high single-photon purity of 97.7% under strong continuous-wave (CW) and pulsed excitation. These results establish organic molecules as a high-performance platform for single-photon generation and represent an important step towards scalable organic quantum photonic technologies.
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BibTeX
@misc{luo2026million,
title = {{100 million photons per second from a single organic molecule}},
author = {Siwei Luo and Tim Hebenstreit and Alexey Shkarin and Jan Renger and Tobias Utikal and Stephan Goetzinger},
howpublished = {arXiv},
year = {2026},
month = sep,
doi = {10.48550/arxiv.2609.29736},
eprint = {2609.29736},
archivePrefix = {arXiv},
url = {https://arxiv.org/abs/2609.29736},
}
RIS
TY - UNPB
TI - 100 million photons per second from a single organic molecule
AU - Siwei Luo
AU - Tim Hebenstreit
AU - Alexey Shkarin
AU - Jan Renger
AU - Tobias Utikal
AU - Stephan Goetzinger
PY - 2026
DA - 2026/09/24
PB - arXiv
DO - 10.48550/arxiv.2609.29736
UR - https://arxiv.org/abs/2609.29736
AB - At cryogenic temperatures, organic single-photon sources (SPSs) offer Fourier-limited emission, virtually unlimited photostability, and emission wavelengths selectable by molecular design, making them attractive for quantum metrology, secure communication, and photonic quantum information processing. However, their efficient integration with photonic microstructures has remained challenging, limiting photon collection from single organic emitters under cryogenic operation. Here, we demonstrate a cryogenic planar metallo-dielectric antenna that efficiently directs the emission of a single dibenzoterrylene (DBT) molecule towards the collection optics. The device reaches a collection efficiency of 97% and delivers 100 million photons per second into the first lens. We measure a photon indistinguishability for the Fourier-limited transition of 91.2% while maintaining a high single-photon purity of 97.7% under strong continuous-wave (CW) and pulsed excitation. These results establish organic molecules as a high-performance platform for single-photon generation and represent an important step towards scalable organic quantum photonic technologies.
ER -