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Journal of the Optical Society of America B

Coherent generation and efficient manipulation of dual-channel robust stationary light pulses in ultracold atoms

Yan Zhang, Qian-Qian Bao, Nuo Ba, Cui-Li Cui, Jin‐Hui Wu

Published Jul 30, 2013• 5 citations
Publisher

Abstract

We study the dynamic processes of reversible dual-channel light memory in a double-tripod atomic system by modulating only a pair of counterpropagating control fields in time. We find that two pairs of stationary light pulses (SLPs) can be simultaneously generated when we switch on both control fields after storage. Two incident signal fields in two channels can be released either simultaneously from the same surface of the sample, or at different times from the same or different surfaces of the sample, depending on the time modulation of the two control fields, the time sequence of the input signal fields, and the group velocities of the signal fields propagating in medium, which could be successfully manipulated in each channel. Comparing with the light storage in spin-wave excitations, the SLPs may suffer a little space-dependent diffusion but maintain optical components required for nonlinear optical interactions. These results could be used to study the enhanced low-noises nonlinear interaction between dual-channel SLPs, which can maximize the interaction time. Besides, this scheme could also be explored to design synchronous multitasking information processing during light memory processes at low-light even below single-photon level.

DOI
10.1364/josab.30.002333

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We propose a double-M\mathsf{M}M system of cold atoms for realizing the reversible storage and manipulation of signal fields encoded in degrees of freedom (DOFs) of polarization and orbital angular momentum (OAM). By employing two pairs of counterpropagating controlling fields, we show that the system exhibits dark state polaritons relating to the polarization and propagation direction of the light fields. Through the active operation of the controlling fields in time, stationary light pulses with polarizations and OAM information can be generated due to the tight coupling and balanced competition between the retrieved signal fields, and can be manipulated coherently and all-optically. Another advantage of our proposed scheme is that the two polarization components of the signal field can be decoupled and thus be independently retrieved from the atomic ensemble, and then the scheme can be employed to realize polarization-dependent beam splitting. Such a multiple DOF-dependent scheme could pave the way toward quantum nonlinear optics without a cavity, and could greatly enhance the tunability and capacity for both classical and quantum information processing.
We propose an efficient scheme for the robust and controlled generation of beating signals in a sample of stationary atoms driven into the tripod configuration. This scheme relies on an asymmetric procedure of light storage and retrieval where the two classical coupling fields have equal detunings in the storage stage but opposite detunings in the retrieval stage. A quantum probe field, incident upon such an atomic sample, is first transformed into two spin coherence wave-packets and then retrieved with two optical components characterized by different time-dependent phases. Therefore the retrieved quantum probe field exhibits a series of maxima and minima (beating signals) in intensity due to the alternative constructive and destructive interference. This interesting phenomenon involves in fact the coherent manipulation of two dark-state polaritons and may be explored to achieve the fast quantum limited measurement.
Abstract Optical nonreciprocity provides a firm basis for direction-dependent control of light transport. We propose a scheme to manipulate two counter-propagating light pulses based on dynamically controlled dual-channel optical nonreciprocity originating from the Doppler effect. This scheme is implemented in a four-level tripod-type thermal atomic medium driven by two counter-propagating control fields. Symmetric or asymmetric propagation and storage scenarios for the two probe pulses can be established by adjusting the detunings and intensities of the control fields. In particular, complete separation of the forward and backward transmission windows enables the realization of a frequency-tunable bidirectional optical isolator. Doppler shifts make the tripod system behave as two weakly coupled three-level Λ-type channels associated mainly with the forward and backward probe fields. Our proposal may have potential applications in designing direction-dependent all-optical devices for manipulating multiple optical pulses.