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Optics Letters

Nonparaxial self-accelerating beams in an atomic vapor with electromagnetically induced transparency

Hua Zhong, Yiqi Zhang, Zhaoyang Zhang, Changbiao Li, Da Zhang, Yanpeng Zhang, Milivoj R. Belić

Published Dec 1, 2016• 14 citations
Publisher

Abstract

We theoretically and numerically investigate the nonparaxial self-accelerating beams in a Λ-type three-level energy system of rubidium atomic vapor in the electromagnetically induced transparency (EIT) window. In the EIT window, the absorption of the atomic vapor is small, and robust nonparaxial self-accelerating beams can be generated. The reason is that the energy of the tail transfers to the main lobe, which then maintains its shape, owing to the self-healing effect. Media with large absorption would demand large energy to compensate, and the tail would be lifted too high to maintain the profile of an accelerating beam, so that self-accelerating beams cannot be obtained any longer. An atomic vapor with small absorption is the ideal medium to produce such self-accelerating beams and, in return, self-accelerating beams may inspire new ideas in the research associated with atomic vapors and atomic-like ensembles.

DOI
10.1364/ol.41.005644

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We theoretically and numerically investigate the nonparaxial self-accelerating beams in a Λ-type three-level energy system of rubidium atomic vapor in the electromagnetically induced transparency (EIT) window. In the EIT window, the absorption of the atomic vapor is small, and robust nonparaxial self-accelerating beams can be generated. The reason is that the energy of the tail transfers to the main lobe, which then maintains its shape, owing to the self-healing effect. Media with large absorption would demand large energy to compensate, and the tail would be lifted too high to maintain the profile of an accelerating beam, so that self-accelerating beams cannot be obtained any longer. An atomic vapor with small absorption is the ideal medium to produce such self-accelerating beams and, in return, self-accelerating beams may inspire new ideas in the research associated with atomic vapors and atomic-like ensembles.
Abstract We demonstrate the existence and curious propagation dynamics of self-accelerating beams in Λ-type three-level nonlinear atomic vapors with Kerr and cubic-quintic nonlinearities through numerical investigation and mathematical modelling. Upon adjusting the generation and propagation conditions, these nonlinear accelerating beams exhibit different evolution properties. We demonstrate that the input beams can propagate robustly in the medium regardless of its absorption properties. The shape and peak intensity of the main lobes of these input beams, which are the eigenmodes of the nonlinear Schrödinger equation (NLSE) in atomic media, are preserved for a significantly long propagation distance. If such beams are not the modes of the system, they are subjected to the under-healing or over-healing effect, which damages the shape of the self-accelerating beams. We also discuss the interactions between truncated accelerating beams, which readily generate non-accelerating solitons and soliton pairs. The results indicate that the atomic vapor can serve as a promising medium for the generation of nonlinear self-accelerating beams.
In this study, we report on the fractional Talbot effect of nonparaxial self-accelerating beams in a multilevel electromagnetically induced transparency (EIT) atomic configuration, which, to the best of our knowledge, is the first study on this subject. The Talbot effect originates from superposed eigenmodes of the Helmholtz equation and forms in the EIT window in the presence of both linear and cubic susceptibilities. The Talbot effect can be realized by appropriately selecting the coefficients of the beam components. Our results indicate that the larger the radial difference between beam components, the stronger the interference between them, the smaller the Talbot angle is. The results of this study can be useful when studying optical imaging, optical measurements, and optical computing.
Recent years have observed fast developments in neutral atomic vapor based quantum information storage technology. The technique utilizes light fields in the optical wavelength region as signal carrier and retriever and neutral atomic systems (e.g. single atoms, ensembles of atoms, atom-like defects in solids) as storage media. Photons are robust carriers of information due to their high velocity (c = 2.998 x 108 m/s) and ease of transportation (they propagate rectilinearly with low loss). Their high mobility, however, makes it a challenging task to spatially localize and therefore store them. Atoms (or atom-like systems), on the other hand, can be easily localized in space while providing quantum states accessible to photons and therefore are ideal candidates for storage media. Electromagnetically-induced transparency (EIT) is a light-induced atomic coherence phenomenon that dramatically modifies the optical properties of an atomic medium to a weak probe field by the application of a strong coupling field. As a probe pulse propagates in an EIT medium it experiences ultraslow group velocity and generates a copropagating spin wave. These consequences of EIT can be exploited for light pulse storage and retrieval in an atomic medium.
Specially designed focusing of light beams has been proposed as a means of improving the performances of optical buffers based on cells containing hot atomic vapors (e.g., rubidium vapor). There is also a companion proposal improve performance by use of incoherent optical pumping under suitable conditions. Regarding the proposal use focusing: The utility of atomic-vapor optical buffers as optical storage and processing devices has been severely limited by nonuniform spatial distributions of intensity in optical beams, arising from absorption of the beams as they propagate in atomic-vapor cells. Such nonuniformity makes it impossible the physical conditions throughout a cell, thereby making it impossible the performance of the cell as an optical buffer. In practical terms simplified for the sake of brevity, to optimize as used here means design the cell so as maximize the group delay of an optical pulse while keeping the absorption and distortion of the pulse reasonably small. Regarding the proposal use incoherent optical pumping: For reasons too complex describe here, residual absorption of light is one of the main impediments achievement of desirably long group delays in hot atomic vapors. The present proposal is directed toward suppressing residual absorption of light. The idea of improving the performance of slow-light optical buffers by use of incoherent pumping overlaps somewhat with the basic idea of Raman-based slow-light systems. However, prior studies of those systems did not quantitatively answer the question of whether the performance of an atomic vapor or other medium that exhibits electromagnetically induced transparency (EIT) with Raman gain is superior that of a medium that exhibits EIT without Raman gain.
We study the nonlinear effect in a three-level atomic system in Λ configuration. As two or more fields are confined within the common electromagnetically induced transparency (EIT) window, they directly disturb EIT dark state at the same time, which leads to the self- and cross-Kerr nonlinear interactions. Our scheme is different from the existed schemes based on three-level or multilevel systems only existing single type of nonlinear interactions. In the common EIT windows, the self- and cross-Kerr nonlinearities are established with suppressed linear absorption and our scheme can be generalized polychromatic Kerr nonlinearity. Because the atoms are almost trapped in the ground states and the atom population becomes unchanged, the scheme is robust to the atomic spontaneous emission. Our scheme is a promising avenue for preparation of squeezing and entanglement .
An electromagnetically induced transparency is observed at one arm of a three-level \ensuremath{\Lambda}-type system in a rubidium D1 line (794.8 nm) with an 85% reduction in absorption, when a pumping field is present at the other arm. This reduction in absorption for the weak probe field is due to the atomic coherence produced by the strong pumping field. This experiment is done in a Rb vapor cell at room temperature with cw diode lasers for both pumping and probe beams in a Doppler-free configuration. A simple theoretical treatment including Doppler broadening is in good qualitative agreement with the experimental measurement.