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Frontiers of Physics

Single-photon-level light storage with distributed Rydberg excitations in cold atoms

Hanxiao Zhang, Jin-Hui Wu, M. Artoni, Giuseppe Carlo La Rocca

Published Aug 27, 2021• 8 citations
Publisher

Abstract

We present an improved version of the superatom (SA) model to examine the slow-light dynamics of a few-photons signal field in cold Rydberg atoms with van der Waals (vdW) interactions. A main feature of this version is that it promises consistent estimations on total Rydberg excitations based on dynamic equations of SAs or atoms. We consider two specific cases in which the incident signal field contains more photons with a smaller detuning or less photons with a larger detuning so as to realize the single-photon-level light storage. It is found that vdW interactions play a significant role even for the slow-light dynamics of a single-photon signal field as distributed Rydberg excitations are inevitable in the picture of dark-state polariton. Moreover, the stored (retrieved) signal field exhibits a clearly asymmetric (more symmetric) profile because its leading and trailing edges undergo different (identical) traveling journeys, and higher storage/retrieval efficiencies with well preserved profiles apply only to weaker and well detuned signal fields. These findings are crucial to understand the nontrivial interplay of single-photon-level light storage and distributed Rydberg excitations.

DOI
10.1007/s11467-021-1105-6

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We present an improved version of the superatom (SA) model to examine the slow-light dynamics of a few-photons signal field in cold Rydberg atoms with van der Waals (vdW) interactions. A main feature of this version is that it promises consistent estimations on total Rydberg excitations based on dynamic equations of SAs or atoms. We consider two specific cases in which the incident signal field contains more photons with a smaller detuning or less photons with a larger detuning so as to realize the single-photon-level light storage. It is found that vdW interactions play a significant role even for the slow-light dynamics of a single-photon signal field as distributed Rydberg excitations are inevitable in the picture of dark-state polariton. Moreover, the stored (retrieved) signal field exhibits a clearly asymmetric (more symmetric) profile because its leading and trailing edges undergo different (identical) traveling journeys, and higher storage/retrieval efficiencies with well preserved profiles apply only to weaker and well detuned signal fields. These findings are crucial to understand the nontrivial interplay of single-photon-level light storage and distributed Rydberg excitations.
We developed an effective theoretical method to examine the successive propagation dynamics of a gate field and a signal field in an EIT medium of Rydberg atoms exhibiting both self and cross van der Waals ( vdW ) interactions. It is found that the slow-light storage of this gate field can be achieved with an efficiency up to 73.5% and a negligible modification of photon statistics. More interestingly, even a single stored gate photon can effectively attenuate the otherwise low-loss signal field containing hundreds of photons during its slow-light transport by exploiting the cross vdW interaction. Therefore, benefiting from a direct insight into the simulated propagation dynamics, we have demonstrated that a high-performance all-optical transistor is feasible with its optical gain (22) and contrast (0.999), two important figures of merit, both better than those reported in relevant experiments. More importantly, through the transistor process, we can obtain single photons that exhibit low biphoton correlation and a uniform distribution, distinct from the previous storage process.
Abstract We study in theory the single-photon Rydberg excitation in an ensemble of two-level cold atoms at finite low temperatures. Rydberg population plotted against laser detuning may exhibit a nonlinear bistable behavior arising from the dipole–dipole interactions manifested as a van der Waals (vdW) potential. We find that Doppler broadening can result in a remarkable reduction of the bistable region, which may disappear as the atomic temperature increases to a certain value, of the order of tens to hundreds of μ K. This special temperature, depending critically on the vdW potential, can be largely raised by partially eliminating the Doppler effect, when a double-photon excitation scheme is used to replace the single-photon excitation scheme.
The effect of strong interatomic interactions on an optical field stored in Rydberg states of a cold atomic gas is investigated. Due to their large dipole moments Rydberg atoms interact very strongly with each other. The strength of these interactions can be significant over length scales of several microns. An effect known as dipole blockade leads to a suppression in the number of Rydberg excitations supported in a medium of finite size. The experiments described in this thesis aim to exploit this effect to create a medium with a non-linear response which occurs at the level of single-photons. A cold atomic cloud is tightly confined such that only a few Rydberg excitations are supported. It is shown that the dipole blockade phenomenon leads to strong photon-photon interactions, resulting in the generation of quantum states of light. A microwave field is used to control the strength and range over which the interactions between the stored optical photons occur. In addition, it is shown that the propagation of the optical field through the medium is non-trivial. Preliminary evidence is presented suggesting that the slow-light group delay in the medium is dependent on the number of propagating photons.
We investigate the light propagation dynamics in ultra-cold Rydberg medium with inverted-Y configuration based on the superatom theory. It is viable to store light information in two types of atomic spin coherence (trivial spin coherence and Rydberg spin coherence), which makes the system a prospective platform for versatile light manipulation. A normal feature is to realize efficient light storage with simultaneous resonant control fields applied. An intriguing feature is to split light into two beams with different intensities and statistical properties if the control fields are applied separately. The beam of light retrieved from the Rydberg spin coherence is severely attenuated and shows anti-bunching character accompanied by the cooperative optical nonlinearity. Moreover, generation and manipulation of beating signal are achievable by applying the non-resonant control fields.
We investigate the storage and retrieval of a multiphoton probe field in cold Rydberg atoms with an effective method based on the superatom model. This probe field is found greatly attenuated in light intensity and two-photon correlation yet suffering little temporal broadening as a result of the partial dipole blockade of Rydberg excitation. In particular, the output field energy exhibits an intriguing saturation effect against the input field energy accompanied by an inhomogeneous nonclassical antibunching feature as a manifestation of the dynamic cooperative optical nonlinearity. Our numerical results are qualitatively consistent with those in a recent experiment and could be extended to pursue quantum information applications of nonclassical light fields.
Mapping the strong interaction between Rydberg excitations in ultra-cold atomic ensembles onto single photons enables the realization of optical nonlinearities which can modify light on the level of individual photons.This novel approach forms the basis of a growing Rydberg quantum optics toolbox, which already contains photonic logic building-blocks such as single-photon sources, switches, transistors, and conditional π-phase shifts.This thesis reports on two experiments investigating strong photon-photon interactions mediated by Rydberg interactions.First, applying a ladder-type EIT scheme to Rydberg atoms in D-states with high principal quantum number results in the Rydberg interaction mediated nonlinearity accompanied by a time-dependent decay of transmission of probe light through the medium.In a joint experimental and theoretical analysis, this effect is attributed to the dephasing of propagating polaritons into stationary Rydberg excitations caused by the state mixing interaction occurring with Rydberg D-state atoms.Second, via a two-photon Raman excitation scheme Rydberg atoms are efficiently excited in a small atomic cloud.As the size of the Rydberg blockade exceeds the dimension of the medium, only a single Rydberg excitation can be present at a time.By fast engineered dephasing this Rydberg excitation is decoupled from the light field.Measurement of the transmitted light and the amount of excited Rydberg atoms gives evidence for the realization of a deterministic single-photon absorber.