Journal of Nonlinear Optical Physics & Materials
AMPLIFICATION AND PHASE CONJUGATION OF WEAK SIGNALS
Oleg V. Kulagin, Guerman A. Pasmanik, Alexander A. Shilov
Abstract
The results of the study on phase conjugation of weak optical signals with the energy of units of photons are considered. Basic concepts of a semi-classical theoretical approach to describe amplification and phase conjugation (PC) of such signals are presented. A review is given on the experimental investigations that allowed for reaching a limit (about 1 photon for a mode) sensitivity of optical systems with PC-mirrors for a large (~ 105) number of resolution elements. High-sensitivity PC-mirror optical systems are demonstrated for a variety of applications.