Dynamics of an atomic wave packet in a standing wave quantized field

Young-Tak Chough

Young-Tak Chough, Sun-Hyun Youn, Hyunchul Nha +2 more

We investigate the single-atom detection system using an optical standing-wave cavity, from the viewpoint of the quantized center-of-mass motion of the atomic wave packet. We show that since the atom-field coupling strength depends upon the overlap integral of the atomic wave packet and the field mode function, the effect of the wave-packet spreading via the momentum exchange process brings about a significant effect in the detection efficiency. We find that, as a result, the detection efficiency is not sensitive to the individual atomic trajectory for reasonably slow atoms. We also address an interesting phenomenon of the atomic wave-packet splitting occurring when an atom passes through a node of the cavity field.

J. Broeckhove, Luc Lathouwers, Piet Van Leuven

Young-Tak Chough

We present an in-depth study on the behavior of an atomic wave packet which is placed in a standing wave cavity prepared in various states of light. We extract a simple classical oscillator model out of the dynamics of the quantum system. We quantitatively resolve the states of the spatially reorganized wave packet by the dressed state spatial probability distribution functions we developed. We also report a novel type of the “quantum collapse and revival” behavior of the Rabi nutation which is originated from the effect of the quantized atomic center-of-mass motion on the atomic internal motion.

Kyungwon An

Young-Tak Chough, Hyunchul Nha, Kyungwon An

We analyze a cavity-QED single atom detection system, in the viewpoint of the momentum-quantized quantum trajectory theory. We find that the detection efficiency is not sensitive to the individual atomic trajectory for reasonably slow atoms.