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Laser Physics

Non-stationary and relaxation phenomena in cavity-assisted quantum memories

N. G. Veselkova, I. V. Sokolov

Published Nov 23, 2017• 2 citations
Publisher

Abstract

Abstract We investigate the non-stationary and relaxation phenomena in cavity-assisted quantum memories for light. As a storage medium we consider an ensemble of cold atoms with standard Lambda-scheme of working levels. Some theoretical aspects of the problem were treated previously by many authors, and recent experiments stimulate more deep insight into the ultimate ability and limitations of the device. Since quantum memories can be used not only for the storage of quantum information, but also for a substantial manipulation of ensembles of quantum states, the speed of such manipulation and hence the ability to write and retrieve the signals of relatively short duration becomes important. In our research we do not apply the so-called bad cavity limit, and consider the memory operation of the signals whose duration is not much larger than the cavity field lifetime, accounting also for the finite lifetime of atomic coherence. In our paper we present an effective approach that makes it possible to find the non-stationary amplitude and phase behavior of strong classical control field, that matches the desirable time profile of both the envelope and the phase of the retrieved quantized signal. The phase properties of the retrieved quantized signals are of importance for the detection and manipulation of squeezing, entanglement, etc by means of optical mixing and homodyning.

DOI
10.1088/1555-6611/aa92e0

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Abstract We investigate the non-stationary and relaxation phenomena in cavity-assisted quantum memories for light. As a storage medium we consider an ensemble of cold atoms with standard Lambda-scheme of working levels. Some theoretical aspects of the problem were treated previously by many authors, and recent experiments stimulate more deep insight into the ultimate ability and limitations of the device. Since quantum memories can be used not only for the storage of quantum information, but also for a substantial manipulation of ensembles of quantum states, the speed of such manipulation and hence the ability to write and retrieve the signals of relatively short duration becomes important. In our research we do not apply the so-called bad cavity limit, and consider the memory operation of the signals whose duration is not much larger than the cavity field lifetime, accounting also for the finite lifetime of atomic coherence. In our paper we present an effective approach that makes it possible to find the non-stationary amplitude and phase behavior of strong classical control field, that matches the desirable time profile of both the envelope and the phase of the retrieved quantized signal. The phase properties of the retrieved quantized signals are of importance for the detection and manipulation of squeezing, entanglement, etc by means of optical mixing and homodyning.
Quantum memories can be used not only for storage of quantum information but also for a substantial manipulation of ensembles of quantum states. Therefore, the speed of such manipulation and the ability to write and retrieve signals of relatively short duration become important. One approach towards enhancing the performance of a quantum memory is to combine an active medium with an optical cavity. Previous works investigating cavity-enhanced memories concentrated on noise processes in the bad cavity limit, that is, for signals that are much longer than the cavity field lifetime. In this work we investigate four-wave mixing noise that arises from the retrieval of relatively short signals from cavity-assisted memories, thus complementing recent works by other authors. We propose an approach that allows one to account for noise sources of different frequencies and different physical origin by using two-band spectral filtering of the noise sources in the Heisenberg-Langevin picture. We demonstrate that in these spectrally selective memories the sideband atomic noise sources contribute to the four-wave mixing noise on par with the sideband quantized field entering the cavity.
Quantum efficiency is an important characteristic of quantum memory devices that are aimed at recording the quantum state of light signals and its storing and reading. In the case of memory based on an ensemble of cold atoms placed in an optical cavity, the efficiency is restricted, in particular, by relaxation processes in the system of active atomic levels. We show how the effect of the relaxation on the quantum efficiency can be determined in a regime of the memory usage in which the evolution of signals in time is not arbitrarily slow on the scale of the field lifetime in the cavity and when the frequently used approximation of the adiabatic elimination of the quantized cavity mode field cannot be applied. Taking into account the effect of the nonadiabaticity on the memory quality is of interest in view of the fact that, in order to increase the field–medium coupling parameter, a higher cavity quality factor is required, whereas storing and processing of sequences of many signals in the memory implies that their duration is reduced. We consider the applicability of the well-known efficiency estimates via the system cooperativity parameter and estimate a more general form. In connection with the theoretical description of the memory of the given type, we also discuss qualitative differences in the behavior of a random source introduced into the Heisenberg–Langevin equations for atomic variables in the cases of a large and a small number of atoms.
Abstract We investigate theoretically quantum entanglement of light with the collective spin polarization of a cold atomic ensemble in cavity-assisted Raman schemes. Previous works concentrated mostly on the bad cavity limit where the signals are much longer than the cavity field lifetime. In view of atomic relaxation and other imperfections, there may arise a need to speed-up the light-atoms interface operation. By increasing the cavity field lifetime, one can achieve better light–matter coupling and entanglement. In our work, we consider the non-adiabatic effects that become important beyond the bad cavity limit in both low-photon and continuous variables regime. We find classical control field time profiles that allow one to retrieve from the cavity an output quantized signal of a predefined time shape and duration, which is optimal for the homodyne detection, optical mixing or further manipulation. This is done for a wide range of the signal duration as compared to the cavity field lifetime. We discuss an optimal cavity–atomic ensemble matching in terms of the cavity field lifetime which allows one to apply less intense control field and to minimize a variety of nonlinear effects, such as AC light shifts, four-wave mixing, etc, which may be potentially harmful to an experiment.
Control of time dependences of waveforms is important for the application of optical signals in the nonclassical state that are recorded in various quantum-memory devices. Matching of waveforms at the signal detectors is needed for measurements using optical mixing (homodyne detection), detection of entangled states, etc. Earlier results for cavity quantum memory on an ensemble of cold atoms show that the waveform of the strong control field can be changed in such a way that the profile of optical signal recorded and readout from a collective atomic spin is convenient for measurements. In the course of recording, the control field provides the suppression of the reflection loss of the input signal related to the destructive interference of the signal and local field at the coupling mirror (impedance matching). Using an example of memory reading, we show that impedance matching provides additional possibilities for variations in the control field and allows efficient generation of output quantum signals with predetermined waveforms convenient for experimental measurements.
We present a new scheme of quantum memory for optical images (spatially multimode light fields) that allows mapping the quantum state of the signal onto the long-lived coherence of the ground state of an ensemble of stationary atoms or impurity centers. The memory medium is embedded in an optical cavity with degenerate transverse modes, which increases the effective optical thickness of the medium and allows one, in principle, to store information in optically thin atomic layers. Since, in reality, storage and retrieval of limited-duration signals, including signals shorter than the lifetime of the field in the cavity, is of interest, we do not use the low- Q cavity approximation. The influence of losses due to partial reflection of the nonstationary signal field incident on a coupling mirror on the storage efficiency is considered. We used the method of approximate impedance matching, wherein losses due to reflection can be minimized by controlling the coupling parameter of the light field with memory medium in time, thus creating conditions for destructive interference of the signal and local fields on the coupling mirror. The influence of diffraction on the transverse resolution of memory at the writing and readout stages is investigated, and the number of effectively stored transverse spatial modes of the signal is estimated.
Ideal photonic quantum memories can store arbitrary pulses of light with unit efficiency. This requires operating in the adiabatic regime, where pulses have a duration much longer than the bandwidth of the memory. In the nonadiabatic regime of short pulses, memories are therefore imperfect, and information is always lost. We theoretically investigate the bandwidth limitations for setups based on individual atoms, or ensembles thereof, confined inside optical cavities. We identify an effective strategy for optimizing the efficiencies of the storage and retrieval process regardless of the duration or the shape of the pulses. Our protocol is derived almost completely analytically and attains efficiencies that are comparable to those obtained by numerical optimization. Furthermore, our results provide an improved understanding of the performance of quantum memories in several regimes. When considering pulses defined on an infinite time interval, the shapes can be divided into two categories, depending on their asymptotic behaviors. If the intensity of the pulse increases with time slower than or as an exponential function then the storage efficiency is only limited by the pulse width. For pulses defined on a finite interval, on the other hand, the efficiency is determined by the shape at the beginning of the storage or, correspondingly, at the end of the retrieval process.