Influence of Vacuum modes on Photodetection

Abstract: Photodetection is a process in which an incident field induces a polarization current in the detector. The interaction of the field with this induced current excites an electron in the detector from a localized bound state to a state in which the electron freely propagates and can be classically amplified and detected. The induced current can interact not only with the applied field, but also with all of the initially unpopulated vacuum modes. This interaction with the vacuum modes is assumed to be small and is neglected in conventional photodetection theory. We show that this interaction contributes to the quantum efficiency of the detector. We also show that in the Purcell enhancement regime, shot noise in the photocurrent depends on the bandwidth of the the vacuum modes interacting with the detector. Our theory allows design of sensitive detectors to probe the properties of the vacuum modes.