Optimized quantum nondemolition measurement of a field quadrature

We suggest an interferometric scheme assisted by squeezing and linear feedback to realize the whole class of field-quadrature quantum nondemolition measurements, from Von Neumann projective measurement to a fully nondestructive noninformative one. In our setup, the signal under investigation is mixed with a squeezed probe in an interferometer and, at the output, one of the two modes is revealed through homodyne detection. The second beam is then amplitude-modulated according to the outcome of the measurement, and finally squeezed according to the transmittivity of the interferometer. Using strongly squeezed or antisqueezed probes respectively, one achieves either a projective measurement, i.e., homodyne statistics arbitrarily close to the intrinsic quadrature distribution of the signal, and conditional outputs approaching the corresponding eigenstates, or a fully nondestructive one, characterized by an almost uniform homodyne statistics, and by an output state arbitrarily close to the input signal. By varying the squeezing between these two extremes, or simply by tuning the internal phase shift of the interferometer, the whole set of intermediate cases may also be obtained. In particular, an optimal quantum nondemolition measurement of quadrature may be achieved, which minimizes the information gain versus state disturbance tradeoff