Influences of quenching and inert buffer gases in degenerate four-wave mixing in alkali vapors

A. P. Smith, Ged Hall, Benjamin J. Whitaker +3 more

Svetlana Shmavonyan, Aleksandr Khanbekyan, Alen Khanbekyan +2 more

Paul M. Danehy, Ernest J. Friedman-Hill, Robert P. Lucht +1 more

G. Grynberg, B. Kleinmann, M. Pinard +1 more

David S. Glassner, R. J. Knize

Degenerate four-wave mixing in alkali vapors exhibits a strong dependence on the angle between the forward pump and probe beams, due to atomic motion. We show that this angular dependence is dramatically decreased by including several hundred Torr of N2 buffer gas in a potassium vapor cell. The angle at which the signal has decreased by half is 250 mrad, an improvement of over 50 times the angle for potassium vapor without buffer gases.

Wulfhard K. Lange, M. Schiffer, E. Cruse +1 more

The influence of radiation trapping on degenerate four-wave-mixing (DFWM) processes has recently been discussed theoretically.1 Its role in the nonlinear behavior of sodium atoms in a buffer-gas atmosphere has also been examined.2 We used an experimental scheme similar to that reported in Ref. 3 to study its influence on DFWM in dense sodium vapor (1013 -1014 atoms cm −3).