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Optics Express

Dual-channel all-optical wavelength conversion switching by four-wave mixing

Gang Wang, Yan Xue, Jin‐Hui Wu, Si-Sheng Liu, Yun Jiang, Zhi‐Hui Kang, Jin-Yue Gao

Published Dec 4, 2009• 4 citations
Publisher

Abstract

We report an experimental demonstration of dual-channel all-optical wavelength conversion switching in hot Rb vapor. In a four-level atomic system, a coupling field and a pump field interact with both (87)Rb and (85)Rb isotopes simultaneously and facilitate the generation of two nonlinear signals when the probe field is applied to the corresponding transition. Each nonlinear signal is switched on and off separately by the pump field at different frequencies based on four-wave mixing and isotope shifts.

DOI
10.1364/oe.17.023332

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We report an experimental demonstration of dual-channel all-optical wavelength conversion switching in hot Rb vapor. In a four-level atomic system, a coupling field and a pump field interact with both (87)Rb and (85)Rb isotopes simultaneously and facilitate the generation of two nonlinear signals when the probe field is applied to the corresponding transition. Each nonlinear signal is switched on and off separately by the pump field at different frequencies based on four-wave mixing and isotope shifts.
We report an experimental demonstration of multi-pathway all-optical switching and routing via efficient wavelength conversion in hot rubidium vapour. We apply a coupling field and a control field to drive both 87Rb and 85Rb isotope atoms into either the double-Λ or triple-Λ configuration when a probe field is scanned across the D1 line of the rubidium atom. We find that this driving scheme facilitates the coherent generation of seven wave-mixing signals with different frequencies and polarizations based on four-wave mixing and six-wave mixing interactions. Also, each generated signal can be switched on and off simply by modulating the control field in frequency to optimize or suppress one specific wave-mixing interaction.
The efficient wavelength conversion of images has many potential applications in optical communication, sensing, imaging, and quantum information fields. In this work, we report on a demonstration of an image transfer between light of wavelength 780 nm and light of wavelength 1530 nm by performing two sequential four-wave-mixing processes in two different hot atomic rubidium vapor cells. Furthermore, we confirm experimentally the persistence of coherence of the input light during this sequential process. Our results may be useful to the research fields mentioned above.
Two four-wave-mixing (FWM) processes can coexist in a four-level Y-type atomic system with carefully arranged coupling laser beams. The generated two FWM signal beams fall into two simultaneously opened dual electromagnetically induced transparency (EIT) windows, which can be tuned to overlap or separate by various frequency detunings. The authors report our experimental observation of competing FWM processes, especially mutual suppression of the two FWM signals when the two EIT windows merge in frequency. Controlling FWM processes can have important applications in wavelength conversion for optical communication.
Based on double optical pumping channels, we experimentally study the competition between two coexistent six-wave mixing (SWM) processes falling into two electromagnetically induced transparency windows by scanning the frequency of the probe field in two similar five-level atomic systems of 85 Rb.By blocking one optical pumping channel unrelated to the four-wave mixing (FWM) process, one SWM process, together with the FWM process, generated by a conjugated small-angle static grating could be observed in the spectrum.Moreover, the other SWM process obtained by blocking the first SWM channel is also observed together with the FWM process in a lower N-type four-level subsystem.These experimental results agree well with theoretical predictions.
The ability to control light with light at ultralow powers has been a major avenue of research in photonics with applications to optical communications, computation, and signal processing. Such light-by-light scattering is achieved in a medium with a strong light-matter interaction, and for the development of quantum information networks it is important to demonstrate such effects near the single-photon level. Alkali-metal vapors such as rubidium (Rb) enable strong light-matter interactions due to the large cross section per atom and well-defined energy level structure, while the use of optical fibers offers the advantage of possible integration with modern optical communication systems. Hollow-core photonic band-gap fibers (PBGFs) can combine both these technologies such that both the atoms and the optical fields are transversely confined to a region that is a few wavelengths in size, which offers the prospect of exploring few-photon nonlinear interactions. We generate large optical depths in such a Rb-PBGF system, and the tight light confinement, high vapor density and long interaction length allow us to perform nonlinear optics at ultralow power. We demonstrate large signal amplification (>100) and frequency conversion using a four-wave mixing process with only microwatts of pump power. This is, to our knowledge, the largest gain observed at such low power. We perturb the coherence of this four-wave mixing to demonstrate all-optical modulation at unprecedented bandwidths (~300 MHz) for an atomic-vapor system, with an energy density of only tens of pho- tons per atomic cross-section, comparable to that achieved in more elaborate setups based on cold-atomic clouds. We then demonstrate an enhancement of several orders of magnitude in degenerate two-photon absorption in our RbPBGF system over that achieved in bulk vapor cells in a focused beam geometry. This allows us to directly measure two-photon absorption from a beam by detecting its intensity on a photodiode. Further, employing a near-resonant, non-degenerate two-photon transition in Rb, we demonstrate all-optical intensity modulation with just a few photons (<20), or only a few attojoules of energy, at relatively large bandwidths (~50 MHz) for such a sensitive scheme. This result takes us to within an order of magnitude of single-photon switching, and improves upon previous experiments for freely propagating optical fields, including those in cold-atoms. Finally, we produce relatively large cross-phase shifts of a few milliradians on a meter beam with <20 signal photons by tuning slightly away from resonance on the same non-degenerate two-photon transition. This corresponds to a phase shift of 0.3 milliradian per photon, with a fast response time of <5 ns. This represents, to our knowledge, the largest such nonlinear phase shift induced in a single-pass through a room temperature medium. Our Rb-PBGF system can thus potentially be employed to realize weak-nonlinearity based quantum computation and quantum non-demolition measurement of photon number. Through these experiments, we show the potential of a Rb-PBGF system for exploring quantum nonlinear optics at ultralow powers. Moreover, our system is simpler and easier to control and manipulate than setups based on cold atomic clouds and/or high-finesse cavities, and holds promise for integration with fiber-optic communication networks.
This study presents a dual-frequency modulation scheme in which both optical and microwave fields are simultaneously modulated in a microwave-optical double resonance system within a hot rubidium vapor cell. The combined modulation produces harmonic spectral features at the sum and difference of the individual modulation frequencies, indicating nonlinear coupling between the fields. Experimental results reveal that this approach enables modulation of atomic population dynamics and facilitates efficient population transfer between hyperfine levels. The observed frequency mixing highlights the system's sensitivity to dual modulation and suggests its potential for enhancing the spectral control of atomic transitions. These findings may support future developments in atomic clocks, high-precision magnetometers, and quantum information processing systems.