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Applied Physics Letters

CdF2:In: A novel material for optically written storage of information

Alexander I. Ryskin, Aleksandr S. Shcheulin, B. Koziarska, Jerzy M. Langer, A. Suchocki, I. I. Buczinskaya, П. П. Федоров, Б. П. Соболев

Published Jul 3, 1995• 65 citations
Publisher

Abstract

We demonstrate that semiconducting CdF2 crystals doped with indium is an efficient medium for optical storage of information in static and dynamic regimes. A metastable phototransformation of 1018 cm−3 In centers from a localized deep state to a hydrogenlike shallow state leads to a change of the refractive index Δn of about 10−4 for the probe beam at the wavelength of 500 nm. The diffraction efficiency is temperature dependent due to spontaneous decay of the grating caused by thermal recovery of the In impurity from the metastable hydrogenic state to the localized ground state.

DOI
10.1063/1.115482

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We demonstrate that semiconducting CdF2 crystals doped with indium is an efficient medium for optical storage of information in static and dynamic regimes. A metastable phototransformation of 1018 cm−3 In centers from a localized deep state to a hydrogenlike shallow state leads to a change of the refractive index Δn of about 10−4 for the probe beam at the wavelength of 500 nm. The diffraction efficiency is temperature dependent due to spontaneous decay of the grating caused by thermal recovery of the In impurity from the metastable hydrogenic state to the localized ground state.
Manipulating refractive index in time allows one to implement quantum storage in an extended resonant atomic system without recourse to inhomogeneous broadening of optical transitions or amplitude modulation of control fields, which when combined with other storage techniques provides the possibility to improve mode or channel capacity of optical storage devices. We discuss different methods of refractive index manipulation in the context of quantum storage applications, giving special attention to a simple frequency shift of an absorption structure relative to the resonant energy levels. We show that a linear modulation of refractive index in time without significant losses can be realized in doped solid-state materials such as Er3+ :Y2SiO5 crystal, to provide optical quantum storage.
The reversible mapping of quantum states of light in cryogenically cooled rare earth doped crystals, represents one of the most promising routes towards the realization of efficient and high fidelity quantum memories. The miniaturization of these devices in robust and monolithic integrated-optics platforms would be beneficial both in terms of experimental scalability and of enhanced light-matter interaction, arising from the waveguide field confinement. Here, for the first time, we fabricate single mode channel waveguides for visible light at 606 nm in a Praseodymium-doped Yttrium Orthosilicate crystal, which is one of the most employed materials for light storage experiments, thanks to its excellent coherence properties. For the waveguide fabrication, we use the direct technique called femtosecond laser micromachining, in which a femtosecond laser beam is focused inside the crystal volume, and produces a permanent and very localized material modification. In particular, we fabricate the waveguide cladding by inscribing a pair of parallel damage tracks which confine light in the in-between region. With this approach, the waveguide core is not directly exposed to the laser irradiation and consequently its bulk properties result only marginally affected. Measurements of the optical coherence time in waveguide gave results comparable to those obtained in a bulk sample and this confirms that the fabrication procedure does not affect the coherence of the active ions. We performed the storage and the on-demand recall of bright coherent pulses in waveguide, using the atomic frequency comb (AFC) protocol extended to the ground state.
Quantum memories for light are important resources as quantum interfaces between light and matter in future quantum information networks. In particular, solid state optical memories based on rare earth ion doped (REID) crystals are of great interest due to their unique physical properties. They provide large number of atoms naturally trapped in a solid with narrow optical and spin transitions. They indeed have excellent optical and spin state coherence times at cryogenic temperatures. Among the various rare-earth doped materials, Pr3+ :Y 2 SiO 5 crystals have shown excellent properties for light storage and exhibit a level scheme suitable for long lived storage in spin states.
Mechanisms of a change in the refractive index appearing in an intensely diode-pumped Yb:YAG-laser disk element are studied with the help of polarisation interferometry and dynamic grating testing. It is found that changes in the electronic component of the refractive index arising upon changing the populations of electronic levels of Yb 3+ ions (the ground 2 F 7/2 state and the upper 2 F 5/2 level of the laser transition) and caused by the difference in the polarisability of these levels are an order of magnitude greater than thermal changes in the refractive index. It is shown that the difference Δ p in the polarisability at the probe wavelength of 633 nm is 1.9 × 10 -26 cm 3 and at the laser transition wavelength of 1029 nm is 1.6 × 10 -26 cm 3 .
Physics Photons are ideal carriers of information. They are fast and coherent, and because they don't interact much with each other they can have very long lifetimes. However, stopping, processing, and manipulating the photons requires them to be stored in a memory, where doing so can damage their fragile quantum properties, which leads to a loss of coherence. Although photons have been coherently stored in and retrieved from ensembles of atom gases, both warm and cold atom clouds, for practical applications a solid-state memory would be desired. Heinze et al. have developed a method to enhance the storage time of photons in a rare-earth–ion—doped crystal. They use a series of laser pulses to initialize the crystal for photon storage and then load it with their “information photons.” By iteratively optimizing the experimental parameters, they show that they can store light pulses and even entire images in the crystal and then retrieve them up to a minute later with their coherent properties intact. The results present an important step toward building a viable quantum network. Phys. Rev. Lett. 111 , 033601(2013).
In this work two induced, third order nonlinear effects were demonstrated. Both phenomena were induced on weak probe beams by a pumping beam in the resonant regime of the nonlinear materials. Both demonstrations were phase independent and were accomplished with low power considering the short interaction lengths. ^ The first phenomena demonstrated was a reduction in a monochromatic probe signal due to a pump signal. The pump and probe were perpendicularly propagated and intersect within a three millimeter square of amorphous zinc selenide. The reduction effect written onto the probe follows a nonlinear profile which saturates with a five percent reduction of the probe signal, while the pump maintains a linear absorption profile. The saturation of the induced effect occurs at low intensity of less than 12 W cm−2. For a helium neon probe, at 632.8 nanometers, the pump induced change in the index of refraction, Δn, and the induced change in the absorption coefficient, Δα, were analyzed in the saturation region using Fresnel equations and found to have the values of Δn = 0.0049 and Δα = 0.0038 mm −1. While resonant saturation effects have been seen in semiconductor doped glass before those effects required a copropagating pump that was eight orders of magnitude more intense. ^ The second portion of this work was centered on amorphous zinc selenide cascaded with semiconductor doped glass. The glass is doped with quantum dots of cadmium sulfur selenide that is available from Schott Glass. The pump used was in the resonant regime and copropagated with a white light source as a probe and both were introduced and removed from the cascaded materials by multimode fibers. The cascaded materials acted as a single period grating which preferentially allowed certain wavelengths to pass. When the material was pumped the preferential pass was reversed. The difference between the probe in the pumped and unpumped state was an expanding sinusoidal with a relative change of ±20%. The preferential pass and the pump induced shift in the preferential regions is comparable to resonance Fabry Perot etalons with an induced change in the optical path length but is considerably more robust. ^