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arXiv:2501.01385 · Physical Review A

Vacuum-induced atomic grating

Muhammad Shuraim, Muhammad Waseem, Shahid Qamar, Muhammad Irfan

Published Dec 23, 2024• 11 citations
arXivHTMLPDF

Abstract

Atom-field interactions, induced by the vacuum of the electromagnetic field, exhibit a variety of fundamental phenomena and effects. In this paper, we study the electromagnetically induced atomic grating due to the vacuum state of the radiation field. Using an ensemble of cold atoms, strongly coupled to an optical cavity, we show that a probe field, propagating through the atomic medium, diffracts to zeroth- and first-order diffraction peaks with few photons and even by the electromagnetic vacuum field of the cavity mode. As the number of photons in the cavity increases, the intensity of the first-order diffraction peak initially rises and then exhibits a decreasing trend. Furthermore, we observe that the first-order peak intensity reaches its maximum at resonance for both the vacuum and single-photon cavity state. However, as the number of photons increases further, this peak at resonance transforms into a dip, accompanied by two side peaks at off-resonance positions. This transition from a peak to a dip may potentially be used to distinguish the quantum state of the cavity.

DOI
10.1103/physreva.110.063717

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Engineered strong photon-photon interactions would enable a broad range of applications in quantum information processing. We demonstrate, using an ensemble of atoms strongly coupled to an optical cavity, that light transmission through an opaque medium may be controlled with a few photons and even with the electromagnetic vacuum field. The vacuum field induces 40% transmission, accompanied by a group delay of 25 ns, which corresponds to the light pulse propagating at 1600 m/s through the medium. The transmission increases to 80% when ~10 photons are injected into the cavity. The strong optical nonlinearity at a few-photon level observed in this system opens prospects for advanced quantum devices such as photon-number-state filters.
Abstract We propose a method to implement electromagnetically induced grating in a phaseonium medium that has been coherently generated via atomic mechanisms. Phaseonium atoms have a Λ-type structure and three distinct energy levels; such atoms are originally generated in a coherent superposition of two lower levels. The phaseonium system is comprised of three-level atoms with a Λ-type configuration, which are initially prepared in a coherent superposition of two lower levels. To accomplish this spatial modulation based on the susceptibility of phaseonium medium, a standing-wave field is used. By looking at how an optical field diffracts at different relative phases, we find that the zeroth and first order diffraction intensities increase as the relative phase changes. We also investigate the impact of the Rabi frequency of the field on diffraction intensity and notice that an increasing strength of the Rabi frequency leads to amplification in the intensity of both central zeroth order and first-order diffraction. Furthermore, it has been observed that a significant rise in diffraction intensity occurs at longer interaction lengths between external fields and the atomic medium.
We show the effect of squeezed vacuum on laser-induced grating in a weak standing-wave-driving two-level atomic system. Using the optical Bloch equation and the Floquet harmonic expansion, we obtain the linear response of the medium with respect to the probe field, which determines the transmission spectrum and diffraction intensity. At the presence of the squeezing, the grating with large intensity both in the first- and higher-order directions can be obtainable even though the driving is relatively weak. The responsible mechanism is due to squeezing-induced gain accompanied by the large dispersion. Based on the spatial gain and phase modulations, the first- and high-order diffraction intensities simultaneously could have the large values. Such a scheme we present could have potential applications in implementing lensless imaging and developing the photon devices in quantum information processing.
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We present a scheme to realize electromagnetically induced grating in an ensemble of strongly interacting Rydberg atoms, which act as superatoms due to the dipole blockade mechanism. The ensemble of three-level cold Rydberg-dressed (87Rb)(^{87}\mathrm{Rb})(87Rb) atoms follows a cascade configuration where a strong standing-wave control field and a weak probe pulse are employed. The diffraction intensity is influenced by the strength of the probe intensity, the control field strength, and the van der Waals (vdW) interaction. It is noticed that relatively large first-order diffraction can be obtained for low-input intensity with a small vdW shift and a strong control field. The scheme can be considered as an amicable solution to realize the atomic grating at the microscopic level, which can provide background- and dark-current-free diffraction.
Photons are excellent information carriers but normally pass through each other without consequence. Engineered interactions between photons would enable applications as varied as quantum information processing and simulation of condensed matter systems. Using an ensemble of cold atoms strongly coupled to an optical cavity, we found that the transmission of light through a medium may be controlled with few photons and even by the electromagnetic vacuum field. The vacuum induces a group delay of 25 nanoseconds on the input optical pulse, corresponding to a light velocity of 1600 meters per second, and a transparency of 40% that increases to 80% when the cavity is filled with 10 photons. This strongly nonlinear effect provides prospects for advanced quantum devices such as photon number-state filters.