Physical Review A

Dressed photons in a nonlinear Fabry-Pérot cavity

Ze Cheng

Published May 20, 2013• 4 citations

Abstract

The photo-polaron in a two-dimensional optical microcavity is investigated within the framework of quantum statistical mechanics. Our experimental setup is based on a planar Fabry-P\'erot cavity filled with a nonlinear nonpolar crystal. The Fabry-P\'erot cavity provides a chemical potential and an effective mass for a photon, making the system formally equivalent to a two-dimensional gas of number-conserving, massive bosons. The incident photons interact with the Raman phonons in the crystal and hence are converted into quasiparticles, which we refer to as photo-polarons. A photo-polaron is a photon dressed with a cloud of virtual transverse-optical phonons, namely, the dressed photon. One of the most important properties of photo-polaron is an increased inert mass. Because of the effect of photo-polarons, we find that the photon-photon interaction is enhanced greatly. The photo-polaron is a quantum effect of cavity nonlinear optics but its increased inert mass is a classical property.

DOI: 10.1103/physreva.87.053825

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