Physical Review A
Single-photon superradiant beating from a Doppler-broadened ladder-type atomic ensemble
Yoon‐Seok Lee, Sang Min Lee, Heonoh Kim, Han Seb Moon
Abstract
We report on heralded-single-photon superradiant beating in the spontaneous four-wave mixing process of Doppler-broadened ladder-type $^{87}\mathrm{Rb}$ atoms. When Doppler-broadened atoms contribute to two-photon coherence, the detection probability amplitudes of the heralded single photons are coherently superposed despite inhomogeneous broadened atomic media. Single-photon superradiant beating is observed, which constitutes evidence for the coherent superposition of two-photon amplitudes from different velocity classes in the Doppler-broadened atomic ensemble. We present a theoretical model in which the single-photon superradiant beating originates from the interference between wavelength-separated two-photon amplitudes via the reabsorption filtering effect.