Few-photon control in nanometer-scale engineered fiber devices

Realization of efficient light-light control is of great technological and practical importance, from both energy and information security perspective. We show that significant four wave mixing efficiency enhancement is viable in the highly nonlinear fiber with engineered longitudinal zero-dispersion wavelength. Dynamic measurement results confirm feasibility of controlling a watt-strong beam by few-photons in the dispersion-engineered parametric device. This method represents an exceptional new avenue for realization of devices capable of operating at a few-photon level.