Quantum interference of correlated particles is a fundamental quantum phenomenon which carries signatures of the statistics properties of the particles, such as bunching or antibunching. In the presence of particular symmetries, interference effects take place with high visibility, one of the simplest cases being the suppression of coincident detection in the Hong-Ou-Mandel effect. Tichy et al., [Phys. Rev. Lett. 104, 220405 (2010)] recently demonstrated a simple sufficient criterion for the suppression of output events in the more general case of Fourier multiport beam splitters. Here we study the case in which $2^q$ particles (either bosonic or fermionic) are injected simultaneously in different ports of a Sylvester interferometer with $2^p\ge 2^q$ modes. In particular, we prove a necessary and sufficient criterion for a significant fraction of output states to be suppressed, for specific input configurations. This may find application in assessing the indistinguishability of multiple single-photon sources and in the validation of boson sampling machines.

• Received 3 December 2014

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevA.91.013811