Constructing light: photon by photon

Although the photon has been discovered over a century ago, it is only since the last twenty years that we have been able to controllably generate and detect certain quantum states of light. Our capabilities to produce nonclassical optical states are however still quite limited. In order to make light suitable for quantum technology applications, we have to extend the region of the Hilbert space we have access to � learn to synthesize, manipulate and characterize any arbitrary quantum state of the electromagnetic field.