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arXiv:1302.0957 · Physical Review A

Cooperative spontaneous emission of three identical atoms

Wei Feng, Yong Li, Shi‐Yao Zhu

Published Sep 30, 2013• 17 citations
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Abstract

We study cooperative single-photon spontaneous emission from three multilevel atoms with one of them being excited for different atomic configurations in optical vector theory. The dynamic evolution is solved by finding the eigenvalues of a 3 \ifmmode\times\else\texttimes\fi{} 3 matrix, and then the relevant decay rates and Lamb shifts are obtained analytically. It is shown that the symmetry of atomic configuration has a big influence on the super-radiance of the system. To obtain strong super-radiance requires not only the distances among the three atoms to be much shorter than the wavelength, but also to have symmetrical distribution. We also calculate the emission spectra and find that it normally has three peaks, but it has two peaks under the equilateral-triangle configuration.

DOI
10.1103/physreva.88.033856

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We study cooperative single-photon spontaneous emission from three multilevel atoms with one of them being excited for different atomic configurations in optical vector theory. The dynamic evolution is solved by finding the eigenvalues of a 3 \ifmmode\times\else\texttimes\fi{} 3 matrix, and then the relevant decay rates and Lamb shifts are obtained analytically. It is shown that the symmetry of atomic configuration has a big influence on the super-radiance of the system. To obtain strong super-radiance requires not only the distances among the three atoms to be much shorter than the wavelength, but also to have symmetrical distribution. We also calculate the emission spectra and find that it normally has three peaks, but it has two peaks under the equilateral-triangle configuration.
We study cooperative single-photon spontaneous emission from NNN multilevel atoms for different atomic distributions in optical vector theory. Instead of the average approximation for interatomic distance or the continuum approximation (sums over atoms replaced by integrals) for atomic distribution, the positions of every atom are taken into account by numerical calculation. It is shown that the regularity of atomic distribution has considerable influence on cooperative spontaneous emission. For a small atomic sample (compared with radiation wavelength), obtaining strong superradiance requires not only the uniform excitation (the Dicke state) but also the uniform atomic distribution. For a large sample, the uniform atomic distribution is beneficial to subradiance of the Dicke state, while the influence of atomic distribution on the timed Dicke state is weak and its time evolution obeys exponential decay approximately. In addition, we also investigate the corresponding emission spectrum and verify the directed emission for the timed Dicke state for a large atomic sample.
We study emission of a single photon from a spherically symmetric cloud of NNN atoms (one atom is excited; $N\ensuremath{-}1$ are in the ground state) and present an exact analytical expression for eigenvalues and eigenstates of this many-body problem. We found that some states decay much faster than the single-atom decay rate, while other states are trapped and undergo very slow decay. When the size of the atomic cloud is small compared with the radiation wavelength, we found that the radiation frequency undergoes a large shift.
We consider collective emission of a single photon from a cloud of NNN two-level atoms (one excited, $N\ensuremath{-}1$ ground state). For a dense cloud the problem is reduced to finding eigenfunctions and eigenvalues of an integral equation. We discuss an exact analytical solution of this many-atom problem for a spherically symmetric atomic cloud. Some eigenstates decay much faster then the single atom decay rate, while the others undergo very slow decay. We show that virtual processes yield a small effect on the evolution of rapidly decaying states. However, they change the long time dynamics from exponential decay into a power-law behavior which can be observed experimentally. For trapped states virtual processes are much more important yielding additional decay channels which results in a slow decay of the otherwise trapped states. We also show that quantum mechanical treatment of spontaneous emission of weakly excited atomic ensemble is analogous to emission of NNN classical harmonic oscillators.
General properties of super-radiance--cooperative spontaneous emission of multi-atomic systems are explained on the basis of some simple models. First we consider spontaneous emission of two atoms separated from each other by a distance less than the wavelength. Then the kinetics of super-radiance of N-atomic system in a small volume are described. The main attention we put into super-radiance photon statistics. We show the Poissonian statistics for the main part of super-radiance pulse and demonstrate the special conditions when it can be Sub-Poissonian one.
The spectrum of cooperative light emission from ensembles of multilevel atoms is studied in optical vector theory and without applying the rotating-wave approximation. The effects of counter-rotating terms are included using a unitary transformation method. The spectra are analyzed and interpreted in terms of the radiative eigenmodes of the atom ensemble. We further show how the qualitative features arise from the structure of the underlying two-particle dipole-dipole interaction induced by the the vacuum field. We predict that for a suitable modification of the ensemble properties, the sign of the cooperative Lamb shift can be reversed, while still maintaining strong superradiant emission. Finally, we discuss the effects of finite detection resolution and of averaging over many realizations of the random distribution of atoms for given ensemble parameters.
We study the collective spontaneous emission of three identical two-level atoms initially prepared in the excited states by measuring Glauber's third-order photon correlation function. Assuming two atoms at subwavelength distance from each other such that they are subject to the dipole-dipole interaction while the third one is located several wavelengths away, we observe super- and subradiant decay alike, depending on the direction of observation. Unlike the case where no remote atom is introduced or no conditional measurements are performed, the spontaneous emission behavior of the conditioned three-atom system is strongly modified, i.e., differing from the single-atom and the canonical two-atom configuration. The conditional measurements associated with the three-photon correlation function in combination with the dipole-dipole interaction between the adjacent atoms lead to quantum interference among the different decay channels allowing one to engineer the spontaneous emission in space and time.