Journal of the Optical Society of America B
Transmission of tunable diode laser emission, through rubidium vapor, as a function of laser intensity
Ignacio E. Olivares
Abstract
We study laser intensity absorption, at the wavelength of 780 nm, in neutral rubidium vapor using a tunable external cavity diode laser close to the Rb85D2 line. The dependence of laser transmission, as a function of laser intensity, was calculated using the optical Bloch equations and compared with the experiment. The calculations were extended to the saturated absorption case and compared to saturated absorption spectra. Excellent agreement between theory and experiment is observed.