The behavior of the ground-state hyperfine coherence formed in coherent population trapping (CPT) is studied. Using potassium atoms cooled with a magneto-optical trap, a pure hyperfine CPT state was prepared in a magnetic field, and hyperfine coherent effects in an open system were experimentally studied with off-Raman resonance oscillations (ORRO). Comparisons were made to full numerical simulations and to a pseudo-three-level model. The frequency and phase of ORRO can be manipulated by changing the relative frequency and phase of the lasers.
The purpose of this communication is to summarize and compare the results obtained under the project "New all-optical systems and methods for magnetic and electromagnetic field measurement", financed by EC (contract G6RD-CT-2001-000642). The main aim of the project is investigation of the potential of different approaches based on the effect of Coherent Population Trapping (CPT) for magnetic field measurement. The investigated approaches are: (i) CPT prepared by coupling pairs of non-degenerate Zeeman sublevels belonging to the two ground-state hyperfine components of alkali atoms by means of polychromatic laser field; (ii) CPT prepared by coupling degenerate Zeeman sublevels belonging to a single ground-state hyperfine component of alkali atoms by means of single-frequency laser field of appropriate polarization at zero magnetic field (MF); and (iii) polychromatic laser field coupls pairs of non-degenerate Zeeman sublevels belonging to a single ground-state hyperfine level of alkali atoms.
We report our study on coherent population trapping (CPT) in a $\ensuremath{\Lambda}$ configuration coupled by magnetic dipole interactions. The $\ensuremath{\Lambda}$ configuration is formed by bichromatic radio-frequency fields coupling a pair of Zeeman sublevels in one hyperfine level of an alkali-metal atom to another sublevel in the other hyperfine level. The Zeeman sublevel at the apex is coupled to a state in the
nP manifold via an optical transition on one of the spectroscopic
D lines to induce optical pumping to a dark state. The configuration is closed without leakage to other Zeeman sublevels. We use lithium atoms in an optical trap for our experimental study. The system allows independent control of the main parameters characterizing CPT, which include the upper-state decay rate and the decoherence rate as well as the Rabi frequencies. By turning off the applied fields, the system is frozen so that its quantum state can be measured precisely. We studied the line shapes and dynamics of the CPT system, and measured the phase relation of the dark superposition state to find excellent agreement with theory. The possible application of the scheme as a method to cool optically trapped atoms below the recoil limit in a manner analogous to velocity-selective coherent population trapping is discussed.
We report the observation of enhanced magneto-optic rotation as the coherent superposition of different hyperfine states is established in an atomic sample. The polarization rotation near the two-photon Raman resonance condition appears to have an analogous characteristic to the well established Faraday rotation observed in the vicinity of a single-photon resonance; however, it contains sharp features arising from coherent population trapping states. The profile of the two-photon rotation signal exhibits interesting features for a slightly imbalanced circular polarization component of the laser field as well as for on and away from the single-photon resonance. The investigation can be used to explore the effect of superposition states generated by coherent population trapping on optical activity. A complete density matrix based numerical simulation that consistently captures all the relevant features of the experiment is presented. The experimental and theoretical investigation can be useful for magnetometry using polarization rotation near two-photon Raman resonance.
We have developed an effective mathematical model to calculate the coherent population trapping (CPT) resonance in periodically modulated light, when the modulation frequency
f varies near the fractional part of hyperfine splitting in the ground state
Δhfs/N (where
N=1,2,...). In such polychromatic field, only two frequency components that are most resonant with atomic optical transitions are taken into account accurately, while all other off-resonant components are taken into account using the second-order perturbation theory in the field. Within the presented concept, equation for atomic density matrix is obtained, in which the contribution of all off-resonant components is reduced to the appearance of two new operators (non-diagonal, in general case): the shift operator and relaxation operators. In the case of three-level
Λ-system, the adequacy of presented effective model was verified by numerical calculations of various dependencies, in which we did not find visual differences from the exact calculations. In addition to a significant mathematical simplification, our model provides a clear physical picture of various features of CPT spectroscopy in a periodically modulated laser field, including effects that have not been discussed in the scientific literature before. In particular, we show that the widespread viewpoint that the CPT resonance shift is determined by usual ac Stark shifts of the lower levels is, in general, fundamentally incorrect, since the contribution to the light shift due to beats at the frequency
Δhfs between different off-resonant frequency components can be comparable (or even dominate) with the standard ac Stark shift. Therefore, even if we have detailed information on the modulated field spectrum (e.g. using a spectrum analyzer), this is, in general, absolutely insufficient to determine the light shift of CPT resonance.
The phenomenon of coherent microwave stimulated emission in a cavity is analyzed for the case of alkali atoms such as Cs and Rb under coherent population trapping (CPT) in a \ensuremath{\Lambda} scheme. The calculations are made in transient and in continuous operation within the framework of a three level model. The coupling of the atoms to the microwave field generated inside the cavity by the atomic ensemble, is fully taken into account; it introduces radiation damping and an imbalance in the populations of the ground-state hyperfine levels, decreasing the intrinsic symmetry of the \ensuremath{\Lambda} scheme. The effect leads also to a broadening and to a frequency shift of the microwave emission profile. A comparison is made with the optically pumped alkali atom maser, allowing a deeper understanding of the CPT stimulated emission phenomenon.