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Physical Review A

Intensity effects in resonant four-wave mixing

F. A. M. de Oliveira, Cid Bartolomeu de Araujo, J. R. Rios Leite

Published Apr 1, 1982• 13 citations
Publisher

Abstract

Resonant four-wave mixing in coupled three-level systems is theoretically studied including high pump-field intensities. A new destructive interference between two contributions to the optical coherent response of the atomic system, leading to total signal cancellation at the onset of the Rabi regime, is predicted.
DOI
10.1103/physreva.25.2430

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A nonperturbative theoretical study of four-wave-mixing processes in four-level systems is presented. Using the density-matrix formalism, numerical results are obtained for two arbitrarily intense pump fields with the third field a weak probe. The fourth wave, radiated by the system, is obtained analytically for some special cases. We find, for different frequency detunings, Rabi frequencies, and relaxation rates that the line shapes exhibit: (i) dynamic Stark splitting and shifting, and merging of resonances; (ii) power broadening with two-photon antiresonance behavior resulting from a destructive interference between different contributions to the optical polarization; and (iii) extra resonances induced by field intensities and saturation processes.
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Considers phase conjugation through degenerate four-wave mixing in a Λ-type three-level system under certain simplifying assumptions, the most restrictive among them being the assumption of symmetrical detuning of the pump from the two lower lying sublevels. When compared to an absorbing resonant two-level system, it is found that significantly higher values of the phase-conjugate reflectivity are possible at pump intensities well below saturation provided the sublevel splitting is less than a homogeneous linewidth. The physical mechanism responsible for phase conjugation is coherent population trapping arising from two-photon-induced atomic coherence between the two sublevels.
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