On the intensity distribution for a two-mode laser beam

N. B. Abraham, John C. Huang, David A. Kranz +1 more

Intensity fluctuation characteristics of amplified-spontaneous emission are found using intensity rate equations and the noise-amplifier approximation for saturation coupling between two and four competing modes. The existence of more than one mode leads to the retention of relatively large fluctuations in each mode even as the amplifier gain is saturated, an operating regime which by contrast has been shown to reduce significantly the fluctuations when only a single beam is present. The noise-amplifier approximation is found to be an adequate approximation of the effects of the spontaneous emission distributed along the length of a laser amplifier. The intensity fluctuations in all cases approach limiting distributions functions as the amplifier becomes heavily saturated. Characteristics of these limiting distributions are found for one, two, and four beams; for combinations of beams copropagating and counterpropagating; in the presence and absence of loss; for differences in gain; and for saturation of the sources due to high intensities.

Yu. I. Zaǐtsev

C. T. Law, A. E. Kaplan

We have shown previously that two strong laser beams (with the same frequency) counterpropagating in a Kerr nonlinear medium with linear dispersion become un stable when their intensities exceed a certain threshold.1 We demonstrate here that the system exhibits large (theoretically unlimited) amplification of a probe beam when the two pumping beams have their intensities slightly below the threshold. This is in contrast to the conventional phase conjugation due to four-wave mixing in a nondispersive Kerr nonlinear medium. The mechanism of amplification in our system can be explained in terms of positive distributed feedback from the Kerr nonlinear index grating formed by two strong pumping laser beams in the presence of dispersion giving rise to a light-induced distributed-feedback resonator. This feedback is attributed to the fact that the weak beams with both signal frequency, ω + δ, and conjugate frequency, ω − δ, propagate with phase speed different (due to dispersion) from that of a pumping wave with frequency ω, which triggers the exponentially increasing energy exchange between weak and strong beams at the nonlinear index grating (this energy exchange is prohibited in nondispersive media). When the probe frequency approaches a frequency of one of the longitudinal modes of the light-induced distributed resonator, and the pumping intensity approaches the threshold of instability, the resonant amplification increases infinitely; for presently available laser intensity stabilities, amplification as large as 104 is feasible.

GORDON J. TROUP

R. Graham, Wallace Arden Smith

Ren Rui-Min, Yin Ya-Ling, Zhizhang Wang +2 more

In order to generate a submicron localized hollow laser beam and realize the more efficient laser cooling and trapping of a single atom, a simple and promising scheme with using the system of a single mode fiber a circle binary phase plate and a microlens is proposed in this paper. From Rayleigh-Sommerfeld diffraction theory, the intensity distribution of the generated localized hollow laser beam near the focal plane and its propagating properties in free space are calculated. Also, the dependences of the dark-spot size of the localized hollow beam on the mode radius of single mode fiber and the focal length of the mocrolens are studied. The calculated results show that the intensity distribution of the localized hollow beam presents approximately symmstrical distribution near the focal plane. In the center of the focal plane, the light intensity is 0 and increases gradually around it. So a closed spherical light field (i.e., localized hollow laser beam) with a radius of 0.4 m is generated. The calculated results also show that the dark-spot size of the localized hollow laser beam decreases with the increasing of the microlens focal length and the decreasing of the single mode fiber mode radius. So proper parameters of this optical system can be chosen to generate localized hollow laser beams with different sizes for various applications. When the localized hollow laser beam is blue detuned, atoms will be trapped in the minimum light filed. If a repumping laser beam is applied, the trapped atoms will be also cooled by the intensity-gradient Sisyphus cooling. In this paper, we build a device for trapping and cooling a single atom by using the generated blue detuned submicron localized hollow laser beam. We study the dynamical process of intensity-gradient cooling of a single 87Rb atom trapped in the localized hollow beam by Monte-Carlo method. Our study shows that a single 87Rb atom with a temperature of 120 K (the corresponding momentum is 30ħk) from a magneto-optical trap (MOT) can be directly cooled to a final tempreture of ～ 5.8 K (the corresponding momentum is ～ 6.6ħk). So an ultracold single atom is generated and trapped in our submicro localized hollow beam. This device for obtaining ultralcold single atom can be widely uesd in the regions of the optical physics, the atom and molecule optics, such as the detecting of the fundamental physical parameters, realizing the quantum computer, studying the cold collision of singe atoms, and realizing the single atom laser.