Related papers: Transverse optical and atomic pattern formation
Photonic integrated circuits with second-order ($\chi^{(2)}$) nonlinearities are rapidly scaling to remarkably low powers. At this time, state-of-the-art devices achieve saturated nonlinear interactions with thousands of photons when driven…
We study off-resonant collective light scattering from ultracold atoms trapped in an optical lattice. Scattering from different atomic quantum states creates different quantum states of the scattered light, which can be distinguished by…
We study, numerically and experimentally, the momentum distribution of atoms cooled in optical lattices. Using semi-classical simulations, we show that this distribution is bimodal, made up of a central feature corresponding to "cold",…
Optical tweezers have become essential tools to manipulate atoms or molecules at a single particle level. However, using standard diffracted-limited optical systems, the transverse size of the trap is lower bounded by the optical…
The development of optical nanofibers (ONF) and the study and control of their optical properties when coupling atoms to their electromagnetic modes has opened new possibilities for their use in quantum optics and quantum information…
The quest for ever higher information capacities has brought about a renaissance in multimode optical waveguide systems. This resurgence of interest has recently initiated a flurry of activities in nonlinear multimode fiber optics. The…
We investigate theoretically light scattering of photons by ultracold atoms in an optical lattice in the linear regime. A full quantum theory for the atom-photon interactions is developed as a function of the atomic state in the lattice…
To manipulate cold atoms in spatially constrained quantum engineering platforms, we developed a lensless optical system with a $\sim$1 $\mu$m resolution and a transverse size of only 225 $\mu$m. We use a multimode optical fiber with a high…
We explore various models for the pattern forming instability in a laser-driven cloud of cold two-level atoms with a plane feedback mirror. Focus is on the combined treatment of nonlinear propagation in a diffractively thick medium and the…
Dewetting of thin liquid films is monitored in situ by atomic force microscopy, results are compared with simulations. The experimental setting is mimicked as close as possible using the experimental parameters including the effective…
The problems of the intermediate-range atomic structure of glasses and of the mechanism for the glass transition are approached from the low-temperature end in terms of a scenario for the atomic organization that justifies the use of an…
We study the realization of lattice models, where cold atoms and molecules move as extra particles in a dipolar crystal of trapped polar molecules. The crystal is a self-assembled floating mesoscopic lattice structure with quantum dynamics…
Atoms in transversely pumped optical cavities "self-organize" by forming a density wave and emitting superradiantly into the cavity mode(s). For a single-mode cavity, the properties of this self-organization transition are well…
We present experimental techniques and results related to the optimization and characterization of our nanofiber-based atom trap [Vetsch et al., Phys. Rev. Lett. 104, 203603 (2010)]. The atoms are confined in an optical lattice which is…
We continue our study of the quantum optics of a single photon interacting with a system of two level atoms. In this work we investigate the case of a periodic arrangement of atoms. We provide a general structure theorem characterizing the…
Nonlinear optics of structured light has recently delivered intriguing fundamental physical phenomena in light-matter interactions and advanced applications from classical imaging to quantum informatics. The mutual interaction between spin,…
Matter-wave interferometry of ultra-cold atoms with attractive interactions is studied at the full many-body level. First, we study how a coherent light-pulse applied to an initially-condensed solitonic system splits it into two…
We propose to use sub-wavelength confinement of light associated with the near field of plasmonic systems to create nanoscale optical lattices for ultracold atoms. Our approach combines the unique coherence properties of isolated atoms with…
Understanding and exploiting the dynamics of complex nonlinear systems is nowadays at the core of a broad range of scientific and technological endeavors. Within the optical domain, light evolution in a nonlinear multimode environment…
Similar to radiation pressure, photothermal effects connect the optical path length to an intracavity field, resulting in nonlinear behavior of the resonator due to thermal effects. Here, we theoretically investigate the nonlinear optics…