Related papers: Optical attenuation without absorption
Resonant light interacting with matter can support different phases of a polarizable medium, and optical bistability where two such phases coexist. Here we identify signatures of optical phase transitions and optical bistability mapped onto…
The atoms moving within the waveguide with a critical frequency higher than the resonant frequency of atoms are suggested for obtaining the "slow light". Due to the absence of the resonant mode in the guide the atoms conserves excitation…
We propose a method for producing on-demand single-photon states based on collision-induced exchanges of photons and unbalanced linear absorption between two single-mode light fields. These two effects result in an effective nonlinear…
Scattering of light by matter has been studied extensively in the past. Yet, the most fundamental process, the scattering of a single photon by a single atom, is largely unexplored [1-3]. One prominent prediction of quantum optics is the…
Ionization-excitation of an atom induced by the absorption of a single photon in the presence of a neighbouring atom is studied. The latter is, first, resonantly photoexcited and, afterwards, transfers the excitation energy radiationlessly…
We present a scheme for eliminating the optical diffraction of slow-light in a thermal atomic medium of electromagnetically induced transparency. Nondiffraction is achieved for an arbitrary paraxial image by manipulating the susceptibility…
We present a method to remove, using only linear optics, exactly one photon from a field-mode. This is achieved by putting the system in contact with an absorbing environment which is under continuous monitoring. A feedback mechanism then…
The interaction between light and matter is fundamental to developments in quantum optics and information. Over recent years enormous progress has been made in controlling the interface between light and single emitters including ions,…
Two-photon optical transitions combined with long-range dipole-dipole interactions can be used for the coherent manipulation of collective metastable states composed of different atoms. We show that it is possible to induce optical…
Spontaneous parametric down-conversion is a well-known process in quantum nonlinear optics in which a photon incident on a nonlinear crystal spontaneously splits into two photons. Here we propose an analogous physical process where one…
A quantum superposition of two coherent states of light with small amplitude can be obtained by subtracting a photon from a squeezed vacuum state. In experiments this preparation can be made conditioned on the detection of a photon in the…
We propose a novel approach to the important fundamental problem of detecting weak optical fields at the few photon level. The ability to detect with high efficiency (>99%), and to distinguish the number of photons in a given time interval…
For dissipation-free photon-photon interaction at the single photon level, we analyze one-photon transition and two-photon transition induced by photon pairs in three-level atoms using two-photon wavefunctions. We show that the two-photon…
In this paper we analyze the dynamics of single-excitation states, which model the scattering of a single photon from multiple two level atoms. For short times and weak atom-field couplings we show that the atomic amplitudes are given by a…
Single photon detection generally consists of several stages: the photon has to interact with one or more charged particles, its excitation energy will be converted into other forms of energy, and amplification to a macroscopic signal must…
The emission and absorption of single photons by single atomic particles is a fundamental limit of matter-light interaction, manifesting its quantum mechanical nature. At the same time, as a controlled process it is a key enabling tool for…
Single quantum emitters like atoms are well-known as non-classical light sources which can produce photons one by one at given times, with reduced intensity noise. However, the light field emitted by a single atom can exhibit much richer…
Superradiance in an ensemble of atoms leads to the collective enhancement of radiation in a particular mode shared by the atoms in their spontaneous decay from an excited state. The quantum aspects of this phenomenon are highlighted when…
A photon carries a momentum of, so one may anticipate light to "push" on any object standing in its path via the scattering force. In the absence of intensity gradient, using a light beam to pull a particle backwards is counter intuitive.…
We consider a photonic crystal (PC) doped with four-level atoms whose intermediate transition is coupled near-resonantly with a photonic band-gap edge. We show that two photons, each coupled to a different atomic transition in such atoms,…