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arXiv:0902.2890 · Physical Review B

Spontaneous emission interference in negative-refractive-index waveguides

Gao‐xiang Li, Jörg Evers, Christoph H. Keitel

Published Jul 2, 2009• 59 citations
arXivHTMLPDF

Abstract

The spontaneous decay of a $V$-type three-level atom placed in a negative-refractive-index waveguide is analyzed. We find that in thin waveguides, highly efficient surface-guided modes are supported, which do not occur in positive-index waveguides. In addition, at low absorption, the mode density and thus spontaneous emission into particular regular-guided modes is enhanced by several orders of magnitude as compared to regular dielectric waveguides. The asymmetries between emission into the different modes and the enhancement of particular guided modes allow us to induce strong spontaneous emission interference between transitions with orthogonal transition dipole moments.

DOI
10.1103/physrevb.80.045102

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The spontaneous decay of a VVV-type three-level atom placed in a negative-refractive-index waveguide is analyzed. We find that in thin waveguides, highly efficient surface-guided modes are supported, which do not occur in positive-index waveguides. In addition, at low absorption, the mode density and thus spontaneous emission into particular regular-guided modes is enhanced by several orders of magnitude as compared to regular dielectric waveguides. The asymmetries between emission into the different modes and the enhancement of particular guided modes allow us to induce strong spontaneous emission interference between transitions with orthogonal transition dipole moments.
Spontaneous emission of photons by an atom placed near the dielectric waveguide is analyzed using global free electromagnetic modes, satisfying necessary continuity conditions at the waveguide boundaries 1. These modes include modes extended over the whole space (travelling) and modes trapped to the waveguide. To describe angular properties of the spontaneous emission, a parameterization of the travelling modes by the outgoing waves has been proposed. Otherwise, using a more common parameterization of these modes by the incoming waves, one has to take into account the interference of different reflected and transmitted waves accompanying photons incoming from both sides of the waveguide 2, what was overlooked in 3. Angular characteristics of the travelling photon emission (a), distributions of the trapped photon emission (b), as well as global decay rates (c), have been calculated using the quantum approach and standard perturbation theory. Enhancement and suppression of radiative decay rates in various configurations have been shown. A certain calculational error, in the treatment of the density of trapped states, in an earlier paper by Khosravi and Loudon 4, affecting emission rates for thin waveguides, has been corrected.
The spontaneous decay and quantum interference of a V\mathsf{V}V-type Zeeman atom placed near a $\ensuremath{\mu}$-negative metamaterial (MNG) slab are investigated. Based on the fact that MNG slab supports only TE-polarized surface-plasmon polariton (SPP) modes, the decay rate of the dipole component parallel to the interface would be much larger than that normal to the interface, because one can couple while another decouple to TE modes. Consequently, high-level anisotropic environment is created and the two dipoles can interfere with each other strongly by sharing such SPP modes even if they are orthogonal. In our work, we analyze the influence of the parameters of the MNG slab as well as the atomic location on the interference intensity in detail. In addition, the dissipation of the slab is considered, and the quantum interference is still excellent even with large absorption.
We examine the spontaneous emission spectrum of a Λ-type three-level atom embedded in a coupled-resonator optical waveguide. Owing to the high degree of confinement of light within the resonators, the waveguide modes can be obtained in the framework of an electromagnetic tight-binding theory. The corresponding density of modes exhibits singularities at the band edges leading to interesting features in the spontaneous emission spectrum such as dark lines and narrow emission peaks. The position and the shape of these features depend strongly on the geometry and refractive index of the waveguide.
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Spontaneous emission in atomic system arises due to the interaction of atoms with environmental modes. Atomic coherence and quantum interference are the most important mechanisms for controlling the spontaneous emission. We show that under certain conditions complete quenching of spontaneous emission is possible. By using V type three level system driven by two fields, the phase dependence of quantum interference is investigated. The Fano type and P type interference mechanism in atomic coherence system driven by microwaves are investigated. In particular we find that both phase dependence interference mechanism may be destructive simultaneously and thus lead to spontaneous emission cancellation in different parts of the spectrum. One of the most important applications of this system is the refractive index enhancement.© (2003) COPYRIGHT SPIE--The International Society for Optical Engineering. Downloading of the abstract is permitted for personal use only.
Exploring the spontaneous emission control of an excited two-level atom interacting with the vacuum within a circular waveguide surrounded by a perfect electric conductor is the main objective of this work. This type of emission is dependent on the intrinsic properties of the emitter, such as the emitter’s transition frequency and dipole moment direction, as well as the surrounding electromagnetic environment. Due to being statistical in nature, the fields do not have a well-defined phase, and thus the emission is considered incoherent or in an uncontrollable direction. We propose an approach to direct the emission from an atom embedded in a circular waveguide . To achieve this, multimode waveguides should be excluded because the total emission is simply presented in three orthogonal directions. In contrast, with mono-mode waveguides, the single photon transports in a single-mode waveguide coupled to a cavity embedded with an atom. Thus, the electric dipole moment vector is forced to take the direction of the only mode in which it is allowed to propagate. Besides giving rise to a single value for the emission, this also provides a way to control direction. Such waveguides have already been produced by recent advances in microfabrication technology.