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Journal of the Optical Society of America B

Slow and stored light pulses in the presence of magnetic fields

Wei-Mien Hsu, Yi‐Hsin Chen, Jian-Siung Wang, Ite A. Yu

Published Jul 12, 2013• 1 citation
Publisher

Abstract

We systematically studied slow light (SL) and stored light in the presence of a static magnetic field, either parallel to or transverse to the direction of light propagation. The theoretical calculations are in good agreement with the measured data, and paves the way for determining the information of optical density, coupling Rabi frequency, and ground state population distribution of a system. We also observed an unexpected double-peak profile in the output of SL and the retrieved signal of stored light under a large transverse magnetic field. Our work provides a better understanding in the studies of SL and storage of light.

DOI
10.1364/josab.30.002123

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We systematically studied slow light (SL) and stored light in the presence of a static magnetic field, either parallel to or transverse to the direction of light propagation. The theoretical calculations are in good agreement with the measured data, and paves the way for determining the information of optical density, coupling Rabi frequency, and ground state population distribution of a system. We also observed an unexpected double-peak profile in the output of SL and the retrieved signal of stored light under a large transverse magnetic field. Our work provides a better understanding in the studies of SL and storage of light.
We theoretically study the linear transmission of linearly polarized light pulses in an ensemble of cold atoms submitted to a static magnetic field parallel to the direction of propagation. The carrier frequency of the incident pulses coincides with a resonance frequency of the atoms. The transmitted light, the electric field of which is transversal, is examined in the polarizations parallel and perpendicular to that of the incident pulses. We give explicit analytic expressions for the transfer functions of the system for both polarizations and for the corresponding group delays. We demonstrate that slow light can be observed in a polarization, whereas fast light is simultaneously observed in the perpendicular polarization. Moreover, we point out that, due to the polarization postselection, the system is not necessarily minimum phase shift. Slow light can then be obtained in situations where an irrelevant application of the Kramers-Kronig relations could lead one to expect fast light. When the incident light is step modulated, we finally show that, in suitable conditions, the system enables one to separate optical precursor and main field.
For all known massive particles, the value of the magnetic dipole moment is different from zero. In contrast, photons in vacuum have no magnetic moment. Here, we describe experimental studies that show that light, when transmitted through a dense atomic medium under the conditions of electromagnetically induced transparency (EIT), can behave as if it has acquired a magnetic dipole moment. In the area of solid-state physics, such effective particle properties (e.g. effective masses) are well known. In our experiments, slow light passing through a rubidium gas cell is deflected when exposed to a magnetic field gradient. The beam deflection is proportional to the propagation time through the cell and can be understood by assuming that dark-state polaritons have a nonzero effective magnetic moment aligned collinearly to the optical propagation axis. In more recent experiments, we have studied different dark-state configurations. We observe EIT, slow group velocities and stored light in a transverse magnetic field configuration, where the moving magnetic dipole is directed orthogonal to the optical propagation axis. The latter can be used for further studies of the quasiparticle properties of dark-state polaritons.
We propose to control light trapping in a large ensemble of cold atoms by an external, static magnetic field. For an appropriate choice of frequency and polarization of the exciting pulse, the field is expected to speed up the fluorescence of a dilute atomic system. In a dense ensemble, the field does not affect the early-time superradiant signal but amplifies intensity oscillations at intermediate times and induces a very slow, nonexponential long-time decay. The slowing down of fluorescence is due to the excitation of spatially localized collective atomic states that appear only under a strong magnetic field and have exponentially long lifetimes. Our results therefore pave a way towards experimental observation of the disorder-induced localization of light in cold atomic systems.
We analyze the energy storage process of light propagating with slow group velocity in a sample where electromagnetically induced transparency (EIT) is created by a strong coupling field. We compare the formation of slow light in EIT and in self-induced transparency (SIT). For SIT, soliton-like propagation of light with essentially reduced group velocity takes place because of the temporary storage of an appreciable part of the pulse energy in the atoms. For EIT, no energy of the probe is stored in the atoms. This energy is transformed to the coupling field and leaves the sample with phase velocity c without absorption. Slow light is formed by a low frequency coherence induced at the input by the probe and coupling fields in a two-quantum excitation process. This coherence propagates as a “spin wave” with small group velocity, and at a large distance from the input, the coherence rules the process of the energy transformation from the coupling field to the probe, reproducing exactly the temporal profile of the probe at the input.