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Optics and Photonics News

Nonlinear Optics in Crystalline Whispering Gallery Resonators

Christoph Marquardt, Dmitry Strekalov, Josef Urban Fürst, Michael Förtsch, Gerd Leuchs

Published Jul 1, 2013• 11 citations
Publisher

Abstract

Whispering gallery resonators made from crystalline materials are compact, stable and highly tunable. These versatile devices can produce light in the classical and quantum domains, showing promise for applications in spectroscopy, metrology and quantum information schemes.
DOI
10.1364/opn.24.7.000038

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Summary form only given, as follows: The high Q whispering gallery modes of silica microspheres are promising for quantum optics and nonlinear optics experiments involving atoms and photons stored in very small volumes. We have developed the technology of these resonators, learning how to couple light in and out through optical fibers, how to obtain and measure record Q factors, and how to probe, by near-field optical microscopy, the electric field distribution immediately outside the sphere. Whispering gallery mode lasers have also been obtained with microspheres made of silica doped with neodymium ions. We describe these experiments and discuss projects involving the coupling of whispering gallery modes to single atoms or ions to perform cavity QED experiments in the optical domain.