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Physical Review Letters

Preparation of Fock states by observation of quantum jumps in an ion trap

J. I. Cirac, R. Blatt, A. S. Parkins, P. Zoller

Published Feb 8, 1993• 235 citations
Publisher

Abstract

We propose a technique for the preparation of Fock states of a harmonic oscillator strongly coupled to a single two-level atomic transition based on the observation of quantum jumps. Examples are taken from the fields of cavity QED and ion trapping, where photon number states and number states of the quantized atomic motion may be prepared, respectively.

DOI
10.1103/physrevlett.70.762

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•Dec 5, 2003•0 citations
We propose a technique for the preparation of Fock states of a harmonic oscillator strongly coupled to a single two-level atomic transition based on the observation of quantum jumps. Examples are taken from the fields of cavity QED and ion trapping, where photon number states and number states of the quantized atomic motion may be prepared, respectively.
(1) A technique for the preparation of Fock states of a harmonic oscillator strongly coupled to a single two-level atomic transition is proposed due to the observation of quantum jumps. Examples are taken from the fields of ion trapping and cavity QED, where number states of he quantized atomic motion and photon number states may be prepared respectively. (2) We discuss a scheme for preparing coherent squeezed states of motion in an ion trap based on the multichromatic excitation of a trapped ion by standing- and traveling-wave light fields. The squeezed state is produced when the beat frequency between two standing-wave light fields is equal to twice the trap frequency, and is indicated by a {open_quotes}dark resonance{close_quotes} in the fluorescence emitted by the ion.
We describe a simple technique to prepare Fock states of the motion of an atom trapped in a harmonic potential. The method is based on using two lasers which interact with a weak and strong transition of the atom successively. Application of a well-defined pulse length on the weak transition leaves the population of some states out of the oscillator manifold unchanged (trapping states). Interaction on the strong transition with a second laser is used to repopulate one of these states via a third intermediate level.
A single two-level atom can be used to prepare an arbitrary photon number state (Fock state) in a high Q cavity . The atom undergoes a controlled succession of interactions with two cavity modes. One of them contains a coherent field. The atom transfers photons one by one from this field to the initially empty second mode. The scheme can be extended to prepare a quantum superposition of the vacuum with a Fock state, a highly non-classical situation. We discuss the feasibility of the experiment with our present Rydberg-atom cavity QED set-up.
A single ion trapped in a harmonic potential and laser cooled at the node of a standing wave can be described in terms of the Jaynes-Cummings Hamiltonian known in quantum optics. Similar to nonclassical states of light we propose to prepare nonclassical states of the ion motion in a harmonic trap. In particular, several schemes for the preparation of Fock states are presented, and techniques for the preparation of squeezed states and coherent states of the ion motion are indicated. For an observation of these nonclassical states we propose to measure quantum collapse and revival in the population inversion of a single trapped ion.
We propose a scheme to generate a particular kind of tripartite entangled states using a single two-level trapped ion coupled to a quantized monomode electromagnetic field within an optical cavity. The resulting state involves motional Schr\\"odinger-cat states of the trapped ion, its internal electronic states, and Fock states of the cavity field. By means of a measurement of the internal state of the ion, it is also possible to generate either entangled bipartite states involving light and motion or single motional Schr\\"odinger-cat states. Our proposal is based on a previously introduced intensity dependent Hamiltonian [Phys. Rev. A 66, 063403 (2002)] for a trapped ion in a cavity.