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Physical Review A

Effect of atomic coherence on temporal cloaking in atomic vapors

R. B. Li, L. Deng, E. W. Hagley, Joshua C. Bienfang, M. G. Payne, Mo‐Lin Ge

Published Feb 27, 2013• 15 citations
Publisher

Abstract

We discuss a different scheme to achieve temporal cloaking in warm atomic vapors. Instead of creating a temporal-spatial window in a patched broadband short optical pulse using static differential dispersion of an optical fiber, we create a temporal-spatial window by directly controlling the propagation velocities of a pair of correlated narrow-band long optical pulses. This method eliminates the phase noise introduced by the broadband short-pulse swapping technique. When the event medium has a fast relaxation rate this leads to a temporal-cloaking scheme similar to that reported in fibers. When the event-medium relaxation cannot be neglected, we discuss a matched-mode scheme that can eliminate the phase change caused by the event field. The advantages of the dynamically and actively controlled atomic system over previously reported work are discussed.

DOI
10.1103/physreva.87.023839

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We discuss a different scheme to achieve temporal cloaking in warm atomic vapors. Instead of creating a temporal-spatial window in a patched broadband short optical pulse using static differential dispersion of an optical fiber, we create a temporal-spatial window by directly controlling the propagation velocities of a pair of correlated narrow-band long optical pulses. This method eliminates the phase noise introduced by the broadband short-pulse swapping technique. When the event medium has a fast relaxation rate this leads to a temporal-cloaking scheme similar to that reported in fibers. When the event-medium relaxation cannot be neglected, we discuss a matched-mode scheme that can eliminate the phase change caused by the event field. The advantages of the dynamically and actively controlled atomic system over previously reported work are discussed.
Recent research has revealed a significant ability to manipulate and control a light beam to hide events in time-domain. Achieving highly functional temporal cloaking, which open up and subsequently close intensity gaps in the probe beam to conceal events from the observer with satisfied performances, are still difficult in optical fiber communication. Here, we propose and experimentally demonstrate a temporal cloak system based on ultra-short-pulse generation and time-domain fraunhofer diffraction. We succeed in hiding 83 percent of the whole time axis and cloak pseudorandom dark return-to-zero data bitrate at 10 Gbit/s. The four states of temporal cloaking and condition of cloaking off have been investigated in this paper.
This thesis deals with the study of propagation effects experienced by weak light pulses as they propagate in atomic media driven by strong pulses. We explore both the ultra-short and long pulse regime and investigate the phenomena that arise at these different time scales. In the short pulse regime, a strongly driven two level atomic system presents transient light shifts, and non-adiabatic transitions occur between these adiabatic levels. We have studied a method to probe these light shifts in real time by propagating a weak probe through the medium. The light shifts enrich the spectrum of the probe and the probe gets shaped as a result. In this way a strongly driven two-level system can act as an active pulse shaper, and can introduce oscillations in the temporal profile of an ultra-short pulse at a time scale shorter than the pulse duration. We also show that by driving the system with two time delayed non-resonant strong fields, the non-adiabatic effects can be rendered phase dependent. This gives very sensitive phase control of the excited state population and can be used to formulate new techniques in interferometry. In the long pulse regime we present a new method of slowing light that can be realized in a double two-level system interacting with two orthogonally polarized light pulses that propagate along different axis. Spatio-temporal dependence of the total polarization induces a grating in the ground Zeeman coherence. The stronger of the two fields (the control field) is diffracted from this grating into the direction of the weak probe field compensating for the absorption of this latter field. A transparency window is thus created in the absorption spectrum of the probe leading to the slowing down of light. The transparency window exhibits characteristics similar to the one obtained by EIT (electromagnetic induced transparency) method. However, the important difference between our method and the traditional EIT method, is that ours doesn't rely on realizing dark state in the system. This may open the possibility of slowing down light in more complex atomic media. Moreover, when the linear absorptive response of the medium is cancelled in this manner, the nonlinear response becomes more important. In the situation where fields propagate in the same direction and have same frequency, two regimes have been investigated. For small optical depths, the effective susceptibility behaves as chi_lin exp[2 i phi] (with phi the phase difference between two fields). This renders phase control of the medium response, and the medium can be changed from an absorber to an amplifier, with normal or anomalous dispersion, by adjusting the relative phase phi.  In the regime of large optical thickness, phase saturation takes place and the effective susceptibility turns into chi_lin*, changing an absorber into an amplifier without effecting the dispersive response (chi_lin is linear susceptibility).
We report the experimental demonstration of the superluminal propagation of multi-spatial-mode images via four-wave mixing in hot atomic vapor, in which all spatial sub-regions propagate with negative group velocities. We investigate the spatial mode properties and temporal reshaping of the fast light images, and show large relative pulse peak advancements of up to 64 % of the input pulse width. The degree of temporal reshaping is quantified and increases as the relative pulse peak advancement increases. When optimized for image quality or pulse advancement, negative group velocities of up to v(g)=-c/880 and v(g)=-c/2180, respectively, are demonstrated when integrating temporally over the entire image. The present results are applicable to temporal cloaking devices that require strong manipulation of the dispersion relation, where one can envision temporally cloaking various spatial regions of an image for different durations. Additionally, the modes involved in a four-wave mixing process similar to the present experiment have been shown to exhibit quantum correlations and entanglement. The results presented here provide insight into how to tailor experimental tests of the behavior of these quantum correlations and entanglement in the superluminal regime.
Considered to only exist in fairy tales in the past, invisibility cloaks have been successively converted into reality no matter in the spatial domain or the temporal domain. Inspired by the spatial cloaking, time gaps are utilized to hide temporal events. However, a sophisticated synchronization for cloaking is indispensable in these cloaking techniques, therefore leaving inconvenience for the realization of the temporal cloak. Here, by exploiting the temporal Talbot effect, we propose a brand new scheme and concept to achieve a temporal cloak without any synchronization for the cloaking process, under which the intensity-modulated event is directly turned into invisibility in intensity through temporal averaging effect induced by the Talbot effect. We successfully realize the temporal cloak for periodic and pseudo-random signals. We also find that the higher order temporal Talbot effect is beneficial to the cloaking performance. Due to the transformed information on the phase, the data could be recovered from the intensity-cloaked waveform, leading to a non-full-field cloak. This method and its concept render a distinct perspective for the temporal cloak, extend temporal cloak to the pulsed-wave, and promote the development of confidential communication.
The light wave propagating in a dispersive medium can be formularized as electromagnetic (EM) fields or quantized as a pair of Hermitian operators. The fascinating optical phenomena display classical and nonclassical properties, depending on whether they can be described by the classical EM field theory. A cold atomic ensemble with neligible inhomogenous Doppler broadening is ideal to explore the interaction between light and matter. A typical problem in classical pulse propagation is optical transients, which induced by rapid response of dispersive medium to the sudden change of the driving radiation fields. With cold atoms confined in the two-dimensional magneto-optical trap, whose optical depth is controllable in our system, optical precursor and free-induction decay both classified as optical transients are observed in a single experiment with different conditions. Moreover, the information velocity limit is verified in superluminal medium, with the observation and analysis of precursors. Characterized with narrow linewidth and long coherence time, paired photons generated from cold atomic ensemble in four-wave mixing process possess irreplaceable advantage in quantum optics area. Temporal modulation of narrow-band paired photons can be achieved by directly modulating the generated photons or by modulating the classical control fields. After successfully reshaping the temporal waveform of the paired photons, heralded single photon source is well prepared for studying the propagation of nonclassical single photon in dispersive medium. The speed limit imposed by Einstein Causality principle is firstly experimentally verified on single photon level.