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arXiv:0902.2048 · New Journal of Physics

Efficient light storage in a crystal using an atomic frequency comb

T. Chanelière, Jérôme Ruggiero, M Bonarota, Mikael Afzelius, J.-L. Le Gouët

Published Feb 18, 2010• 81 citations
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Abstract

We demonstrate efficient and reversible mapping of a light field on to a thulium-doped crystal using an atomic frequency comb (AFC). Owing to an accurate spectral preparation of the sample, we reach an efficiency of nine per cent. Our interpretation of the data is based on an original spectral analysis of the AFC. By independently measuring the absorption spectrum, we show that the efficiency is limited by both the available optical thickness and the preparation procedure at large absorption depth for a given bandwidth. The experiment is repeated with less than one photon per pulse and single-photon counting detectors. We clearly observe that the AFC protocol is compatible with the noise level required for weak quantum field storage.

DOI
10.1088/1367-2630/12/2/023025

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We demonstrate efficient and reversible mapping of a light field on to a thulium-doped crystal using an atomic frequency comb (AFC). Owing to an accurate spectral preparation of the sample, we reach an efficiency of nine per cent. Our interpretation of the data is based on an original spectral analysis of the AFC. By independently measuring the absorption spectrum, we show that the efficiency is limited by both the available optical thickness and the preparation procedure at large absorption depth for a given bandwidth. The experiment is repeated with less than one photon per pulse and single-photon counting detectors. We clearly observe that the AFC protocol is compatible with the noise level required for weak quantum field storage.
We experimentally demonstrate the storage of 1060 temporal modes onto a thulium-doped crystal using an atomic frequency comb (AFC). The comb covers 0.93 GHz defining the storage bandwidth. As compared to previous AFC preparation methods (pulse sequences, i.e. amplitude modulation), we only use frequency modulation to produce the desired optical pumping spectrum. To ensure an accurate spectrally selective optical pumping, the frequency-modulated laser is self-locked on the atomic comb. Our approach is general and should be applicable to a wide range of rare-earth-doped materials in the context of multimode quantum memory.
Atomic Frequency Comb (AFC) protocol has been particularly successful recently to demonstrate the storage of quantum information in a solid medium (rare-earth doped crystals). The AFC is inspired by the photon-echo technique. We show in this paper that the AFC is actually closely related to the slow-light based storage protocols extensively used in atomic vapours. Experimental verifications are performed in thulium doped YAG (Tm3+:YAG). We clarify the interplay between absorption and dispersion and propose a classification of the existing protocols.
We design and implement an atomic frequency comb quantum memory for 793-nm wavelength photons using a monolithic cavity based on a thulium- (Tm-) doped Y3Al5O12{\mathrm{Y}}_{3}{\mathrm{Al}}_{5}{\mathrm{O}}_{12}Y3​Al5​O12​ crystal. Approximate impedance matching results in the absorption of 90% of input photons and a memory efficiency of $(27.5\ifmmode\pm\else\textpm\fi{}2.7)%$ over a 500-MHz bandwidth. The cavity enhancement leads to a significant improvement over the previous efficiency in Tm-doped crystals using a quantum memory protocol. In turn, this allows us to store and recall quantum states of light in such a memory. Our results demonstrate progress toward efficient and faithful storage of single-photon qubits with a large time-bandwidth product and multimode capacity for quantum networking.
A light-storage experiment with a total (storage and retrieval) efficiency η=56% is carried out by enclosing a sample, with a single-pass absorption of 10%, in an impedance-matched cavity. The experiment is carried out using the atomic frequency comb (AFC) technique in a praseodymium-doped crystal (0.05%Pr(3+):Y2SiO5) and the cavity is created by depositing reflection coatings directly onto the crystal surfaces. The AFC technique has previously by far demonstrated the highest multimode capacity of all quantum memory concepts tested experimentally. We claim that the present work shows that it is realistic to create efficient, on-demand, long storage time AFC memories.
We study the efficiency of the atomic frequency comb storage protocol. We show that for a given optical depth, the preparation procedure can be optimize to significantly improve the retrieval. Our prediction is well supported by the experimental implementation of the protocol in a Tm3+{\mathrm{Tm}}^{3+}Tm3+:YAG crystal. We observe a net gain in efficiency from 10 to 1717%17 by applying the optimized preparation procedure. In the perspective of high bandwidth storage, we investigate the protocol under different magnetic fields. We analyze the effect of the Zeeman and superhyperfine interaction.