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Quantum and Semiclassical Optics Journal of the European Optical Society Part B

Stopped atomic wavepackets generated by interaction with a square-profile laser beam

Luis Pumares, Luis Plaja, L. Roso, Kazimierz Rza̧żewski

Published Jun 1, 1996• 6 citations
Publisher

Abstract

The propagation of a two-level atomic wavepacket across a monochromatic laser beam is considered. For small incident kinetic energies of the atom, the wave nature of the centre-of-mass motion becomes apparent. For certain situations, we show that one of the dressed states cannot propagate inside the laser beam, giving rise to an evanescent atomic wavepacket. Their characteristic features close to the condition of evanescent (or non-propagating) wavepackets are analysed. In particular, we present two different situations where almost stopped wavepackets appear.

DOI
10.1088/1355-5111/8/3/027

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Journal of Physics B Atomic and Molecular Physics•Aug 21, 1977•149 citations
The propagation of a two-level atomic wavepacket across a monochromatic laser beam is considered. For small incident kinetic energies of the atom, the wave nature of the centre-of-mass motion becomes apparent. For certain situations, we show that one of the dressed states cannot propagate inside the laser beam, giving rise to an evanescent atomic wavepacket. Their characteristic features close to the condition of evanescent (or non-propagating) wavepackets are analysed. In particular, we present two different situations where almost stopped wavepackets appear.
The propagation of a two-level atomic wave packet across a laser beam is considered. For small incident kinetic energies of the atom, the wave nature of the center-of-mass motion becomes apparent, giving reflections and refractions in the case of a square profile of the laser beam. When the incident momentum is low enough, we show that one of the dressed states cannot propagate inside the laser beam, giving rise to an evanescent atomic wave packet. Also a stopped excited component is found when the incident momentum equals in modulus---not in direction---the one-photon recoil. \textcopyright{} 1996 The American Physical Society.
In the reflection of atoms by evanescent wave the amplitude of the light field can be changed not necessarily adiabatically slow in comparison with relaxation of internal atomic motion. An approach to describe the reflection of atoms by evanescent wave is the dressed state picture. An atomic mirror can be formed also by a focused elliptical laser beam, in which atoms intersect near the waist of the laser beam. A simple evanescent wave allows one to create a high homogeneous field along the surface of an atomic mirror, without a limitation on the intensity of the field in an evanescent wave. The size of an atomic mirror is usually restricted by the laser intensity required by the reflection. There are several processes at the reflection of atom by light which could lead to non ideal properties of the mirror. One of the remarkable properties of an atomic mirror is its ability to reflect atoms in a certain quantum state.
Atomic motion in a pulsed evanescent wave, with a pulse duration on the order of the lifetime of the excited state, is calculated using the semiclassical Bloch-equation approach. The equations for the internal atomic motion are solved using two approximations based on high laser intensity and on slow atomic velocity. The center-of-mass motion in the field under the effect of the dipole force is subsequently determined by numerical integration. As an example, the calculations show that the maximum normally incident velocity allowing a sodium atom to be reflected is approximately 35 m/s when using a 10 MW/cm 2 laser pulse of 7 ns duration. Our results also demonstrate that the velocity distribution of the reflected atoms may considerably differ from the distribution of the incident atoms due to different deceleration and acceleration times in a short laser pulse. This effect may lead to an average slowing-down of the reflected part of a thermal particle beam.
A dressed-atom approach is generalised for studying several effects which could be observed on an atomic beam interacting with two monochromatic resonant laser beams saturating two atomic transitions sharing a common level, a situation which occurs frequently in stepwise excitation experiments. The problem of the optimisation of the population of the upper state is investigated. Analytical expressions are derived for the positions, the widths and the weights of the various components of the fluorescence and absorption spectra. The results obtained at the limit where one of the two lasers has a much weaker intensity than the other one are interpreted perturbatively by treating to lowest orders the scattering of the weak laser beam by the atom dressed by the intense one.