Generalized Bloch-Siegert shift in an artificial trapped ion

Zofia Białynicka-Birula, Iwo Białynicki‐Birula

Jinyi Zhang, Christoph Eigen, Raphael Lopes +5 more

Ion Lizuain, Juan Gonzalo Muga, Jürgen Eschner

When trapped atoms are illuminated by weak lasers, off-resonant transitions cause shifts in the frequencies of the vibrational-sideband resonances. These frequency shifts may be understood in terms of Stark shifts of the individual levels or, as proposed here, as a vibrational Bloch-Siegert shift, an effect closely related to the usual (radio-frequency or optical) Bloch-Siegert shift and associated with rapidly oscillating terms when the rotating wave approximation is not made. Explicit analytic expressions are derived and compared to numerical results, and the similarities and differences between the usual and the vibrational Bloch-Siegert shifts are also spelled out.

P. E. Toschek, Sascha Wallentowitz

L Armstrong, S. Feneuille

The effect on a simple two-level atom of an electromagnetic field having an arbitrary distribution of photon occupation numbers is considered. It is shown that atomic energy levels shift of the order of magnitude of the Bloch-Siegert shift can be produced by interference between different states of the field. The interference term is similar to a phase term which appears in the calculation of the classical Bloch-Siegert shift. It is predicted that in general this term will average to zero, thus permitting interference effects between states of the field to be neglected.

Q. A. Turchette, B. E. King, Christopher J. Myatt +6 more