Beam splitter
OverviewQuantum mechanical descriptionDesignsPhase shiftClassical lossless beam splitterUse in experimentsReflection beam splitters
In quantum mechanics, the electric fields are operators as explained by second quantization and Fock states. Each electrical field operator can further be expressed in terms of modes representing the wave behavior and amplitude operators, which are typically represented by the dimensionless creation and annihilation operators. In this theory, the four ports of the beam splitter are represented by a photon number state and the action of a creation operation is . The following is a simplified version of Ref. The