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Physical Review A

Superradiant Effects in Systems of Two-Level Atoms

Carlos R. Stroud, Joseph H. Eberly, W. L. Lama, L. Mandeļ

Published Mar 1, 1972• 126 citations
Publisher

Abstract

The problem of the evolution in time of a system of two-level atoms that are coupled through their electromagnetic fields, is studied and solved in the framework of semiclassical radiation theory. The atoms may be in any initial states and the radiation reaction is fully taken into account. Both superradiance and time-dependent frequency shift or chirping effects are found. The assumption that all the atoms see the same field is shown to place severe constraints on the evolution of the system, in the form of constants of the motion. These constraints are most easily pictured in terms of the Bloch-vector representation of the atomic system, and they lead to explicit solutions for the time development of each atom. It is shown that the evolution of the complex system is describable by means of a collective super Bloch vector, whose behavior is similar to the behavior of the Bloch vector for a single isolated atom. The constraints on the motion also imply that the system cannot radiate all its energy coherently; some of it remains trapped, to be dissipated ultimately by incoherent processes. Some curves are presented to illustrate the behavior of the system in special cases.

DOI
10.1103/physreva.5.1094

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Journal of Physics A Mathematical and General•Apr 1, 1980•11 citations
The problem of the evolution in time of a system of two-level atoms that are coupled through their electromagnetic fields, is studied and solved in the framework of semiclassical radiation theory. The atoms may be in any initial states and the radiation reaction is fully taken into account. Both superradiance and time-dependent frequency shift or chirping effects are found. The assumption that all the atoms see the same field is shown to place severe constraints on the evolution of the system, in the form of constants of the motion. These constraints are most easily pictured in terms of the Bloch-vector representation of the atomic system, and they lead to explicit solutions for the time development of each atom. It is shown that the evolution of the complex system is describable by means of a collective super Bloch vector, whose behavior is similar to the behavior of the Bloch vector for a single isolated atom. The constraints on the motion also imply that the system cannot radiate all its energy coherently; some of it remains trapped, to be dissipated ultimately by incoherent processes. Some curves are presented to illustrate the behavior of the system in special cases.
The fluctuation properties of a system of two level atoms are investigated by introducing a random precession term into the equations of motion of the atomic super Bloch vector. Starting from the assumptions of neoclassical radiation theory a general formula for the dipole field of a small system of atoms is derived. The intensity fluctuations are calculated in the narrowing limit for two extreme cases of very large and very small atomic to thermal energy ratios. The former case, describing a true superradiant emission, involves asymptotic solutions to the Fokker-Planck equation. The latter case, treated by perturbation theory, corresponds to spontaneous emission in the presence of incoherent pumping.
An improved form of semiclassical radiation theory is developed which includes the effect of the atom's radiation field back on the atom. This formalism is applied to the problem of a single "two-level atom" interacting with a monochromatic field. The resulting equations are solved without resorting to time-dependent perturbation theory, and are found to predict the behavior of the system over times long compared with the lifetime for spontaneous transitions. Not only stimulated emission and absorption, but also spontaneous emission with the proper Einstein AAA coefficient, and a frequency shift which agrees at least semiquantitatively with the Lamb shift are described. In addition, several nonlinear effects involving the interference between spontaneous and stimulated radiation are described, and new experiments which might detect such effects are suggested.
In this paper we attempt to unify the theoretical treatment of a variety of cooperative interaction phenomena occurring in resonantly interacting radiation-matter systems. The system consists of a multimode optical field interacting with NNN resonant atoms in a region of large spatial extent. The field and atoms may or may not be coupled to reservoirs. We derive a set of coupled master equations for the reduced matter and radiation density operators of the composite system in the first Born approximation, using a method due to Bogoliubov. These equations describe within a single framework phenomena involving superradiant emission and coherent propagation. In the first place, our theory generalizes existing formulations of the superradiance problem by treating the radiation field as part of the dynamical system rather than as a reservoir. Hence, our equations describe stimulated interaction effects, which are entirely absent in the usual superradiance master equations. Moreover, our equations contain terms describing the self-consistent interaction of an average field with a set of polarizable atoms, as in the coupled Bloch and Maxwell equations of the theory of coherent pulse propagation, and enable us to describe fluctuations, arising from incoherent emission, about the average behavior described by the Bloch-Maxwell theory. We solve formally the dynamical equation for the radiation density operator and obtain a displaced multivariate Gaussian distribution centered on the solution of the Maxwell wave equation, which has as parameters the first and second moments of the matter density operator. Then we derive and discuss the field and atomic-moment equations, both in the wave-number and position representations. The moment equations enable us to show the relationship between descriptions of superradiant damping based on the Bloch equations and those based on the existence of correlated atomic states, including both as special cases. We introduce reduced matter moments, which allow us to separate incoherent- and coherent-emission effects and enable us to discuss the question of the closure of the moment equations. Then we consider cases where the behavior of the atomic system is dominated by a strong coherent pump wave or where the atoms are in a symmetric correlated state and show how the slowly-varying-envelope approximation simplifies the radiation-moment equations in these two cases. In the former case, we obtain an approximate theory which consists, in lowest order, of the Bloch-Maxwell equations with radiative-damping terms, plus an equation describing the time development of the correlation function for field fluctuations. Returning to our general formalism, we relate the usual parameters of the theory of radiative decay and of resonant interactions to the more general quantities appearing in our spatial analysis. Finally, we discuss the importance of the stimulated-emission terms appearing in our theory and describe several extensions, including the introduction of inhomogeneous broadening.
An improved form of semiclassical radiation theory is developed which includes the effect of the atom's radiation field back on the atom. This formalism is applied to the problem of a single two-level atom interacting with a monochromatic field. The resulting equations are solved without resorting to time-dependent perturbation theory, and are found to predict the behavior of the system over times long compared with the lifetime for spontaneous transitions. Not only stimulated emission and absorption, but also spontaneous emission with the proper Einstein AAA coefficient, and a frequency shift which agrees at least semiquantitatively with the Lamb shift are described. In addition, several nonlinear effects involving the interference between spontaneous and stimulated radiation are described, and new experiments which might detect such effects are suggested.
The interaction between electromagnetic radiation and two three-level atoms is investigated. The atom-atom separation is assumed to be smaller than the corresponding mean resonance wavelength. The total radiance rate of the atomic system is calculated as a function of time. Explicit results are given for several different initial states of the atomic system. Some of them exhibit superradiance, and some act as photon-trapping states. Instead of exponential decay, the oscillations appear in the time evolution of the radiation rate due to the correlation between atoms. The decay constants and coupling decay constants show strong effects on the emission rates. Completely differing from two identical double-level atoms, the cooperative effects always exist in the three-level atomic system except for the case in which the coupling decay constants ${\ensuremath{\gamma}}_{12}$ and ${\ensuremath{\gamma}}_{21}$ are zero.
A method utilising the coherent state variables for the electromagnetic field and appropriate spin variables for two-level atomsis developed for obtaining the dynamical evolution of the field and the atoms separately. The case of a single radiation mode interacting with two two-level atoms is studied. The time evolution of the photon number, starting from n photons and both atoms at their higher levels, is given. Furthermore, when the initial state consists of n photons and one of the atoms in its excited state with the other in its ground state, the temporal development of the photon number, as well as the motion of each atom, are obtained. In the latter case it becomes apparent that energy exchange takes place among the atomic systems, while the field acts as a transfer agent.