Four-wave mixing in rubidium vapour with structured light and an external cavity

丁冬生, 周志远, 史保森

Ryan M. Camacho, Praveen K. Vudyasetu, John C. Howell

Raphael C. Pooser, Alberto M. Marino, Vincent Boyer +1 more

Rachel F. Offer, Dalius Stulga, Erling Riis +2 more

Atomic vapours are an experimentally simple and efficient system in which to study nonlinear wave mixing. We study a four-wave mixing (FWM) process in rubidium vapour which efficiently converts 780 and 776 nm light to 420 nm and 5.2 μm fields. In particular, we quantitatively investigate the transfer of orbital angular momentum (OAM) between the FWM fields. OAM, and structured light more generally, is an important research tool for optical manipulation, imaging and communication. Phase-matched nonlinear processes are both longitudinally and transversely phase coherent, and therefore OAM, which is associated with spiral phase fronts, must be conserved between the pump and generated fields. This makes wave mixing an ideal tool for frequency conversion and generation of a variety of OAM states for use in both classical and quantum communication.

Rachel F. Offer, Johnathan W. C. Conway, Erling Riis +2 more

Atomic vapours are a versatile tool for studying a wide range of nonlinear phenomena. In particular, quasi-resonant atomic systems allow processes such as electromagnetically induced transparency, fast and slow light, lasing without inversion and four wave mixing (FWM) to be studied at low light intensities. The resonant enhancement of FWM in a rubidium vapour is such that it can be used for efficient frequency up-conversion of near-infrared light (780 and 776 nm) to blue light (420 nm) [1-4].

Ulrich Vogl, Ryan T. Glasser, Paul D. Lett

We investigate the propagation of pre-existing quantum correlations through a fast-light medium with an experiment based on two successive four-wave mixing processes in rubidium vapour.