We report on the fast excitation of a single atom coupled to an optical cavity using laser pulses that are much shorter than all other relevant processes. The cavity frequency constitutes a control parameter that allows the creation of single photons in a superposition of two tunable frequencies. Each photon emitted from the cavity thus exhibits a pronounced amplitude modulation determined by the oscillatory energy exchange between the atom and the cavity. Our technique constitutes a versatile tool for future quantum networking experiments.
We have studied the coherent excitation of a strongly coupled QD/photonic crystal cavity system. Time-resolved reflectivity measurements show the vacuum Rabi oscillation of the dot in the cavity. Next, we considered the resonant driving of a cavity-detuned dot, which efficiently populates the cavity mode. This cavity-controlled read-out channel allows high-resolution single quantum dot spectroscopy. Autocorrelation measurements on the cavity mode show antibunching and suggest the use of the resonantly driven QD/cavity system as an on-demand source of single photons with potentially near-unity …
We investigate the quantum interference effects of single photon transfer in two-atom cavity system caused by external excitation phase. In the proposed system, two identical atoms (with different positions in the optical cavity) are firstly prepared into a timed state by an external single photon field. During the excitation, the atoms grasp different phases which depend on the spatial positions of the atoms in the cavity. Due to strong resonant interaction between two atoms and optical cavity mode the absorbed input photon can be efficiently transferred from the atoms to the resonant cavity …
Ultracold $^{87}$Rb atoms are delivered into a high-finesse optical micro-cavity using a translating optical lattice trap and detected via the cavity field. The atoms are loaded into an optical lattice from a magneto-optic trap (MOT) and transported 1.5 cm into the cavity. Our cavity satisfies the strong-coupling requirements for a single intracavity atom, thus permitting real-time observation of single atoms transported into the cavity. This transport scheme enables us to vary the number of intracavity atoms from 1 to $>$100 corresponding to a maximum atomic cooperativity parameter of 5400, t…
In this article we discuss two schemes of teleportation of atomic states. In the first scheme we consider atoms in a three-level cascade configuration and in the second scheme we consider atoms in a three-level lambda configuration. The experimental realization proposed makes use of cavity Quatum Electrodynamics involving the interaction of Rydberg atoms with a micromaser cavity prepared in a state $|ψ>_{C}=(|0> +|1>)/\sqrt{2}$
We present a scheme to generate maximally entangled states of two three-level atoms with a nonresonant cavity by cavity-assisted collisions. Since the cavity field is only virtually excited no quantum information will be transferred from the atoms to the cavity.
We investigate the transmission spectrum of an optical cavity coupled with four-level atoms. Multiple normal-mode splitting peaks of the strongly coupled atom-cavity system are obtained as single cavity mode couples three separated atomic transitions simultaneously. We employ a confocal optical cavity and an ensemble of cold Rb-85 atoms for cavity quantum electrodynamics. We observe four normal-mode splitting peaks of the cavity transmission in the strong coupling regime due to collective enhancement of the atom-cavity coupling strength by ensemble of cold atoms. The experimental observations …
We investigate the fluorescence spectrum of a two-level atom in a cavity when the atom is driven by a classical field. We show that forbidden dipole transitions in the Jaynes-Cummings Ladder structure are induced in the presence of the cavity damping, which deteriorates the degree of otherwise perfect destructive interference among the transition channels. With the larger cavity decay, these transitions are more enhanced.
I theoretically study the behavior of strong pulses exciting emitters inside a cavity. The ensemble is supposed to be inhomogeneously broadened and the cavity matched finding application in quantum storage of optical or RF photons. My analysis is based on energy and pulse area conservation rules predicting important distortions for specific areas. It is well supported by numerical simulations. I propose a qualitative interpretation in terms of slow-light. The analogy with the free space situation is remarkable.
We propose a scheme to deterministically generate atomic two-dimensional and three-dimensional entangled states by passing two 87Rb atoms through a high-Q bi-mode cavity alternately. The scheme is insensitive to atomic spontaneous decay because of large atom-cavity detuning, the influence of cavity decay is also discussed. Our strictly numerical simulation shows our proposal is good enough to demonstrate the generation of atomic entanglement with high fidelity and within the current experimental technologies.
In this article we discuss a scheme of teleportation of atomic states. The experimental realization proposed makes use of cavity Quatum Electrodynamics involving the interaction of Rydberg atoms with a micromaser cavity prepared in a coherent state. We start presenting a scheme to prepare atomic Bell states via the interaction of atoms with a cavity. In our scheme the cavity and some atoms play the role of auxiliary systems used to achieve the teleportation.
We propose a robust and decoherence insensitive scheme to generate controllable entangled states of two three-level atoms interacting with an optical cavity and a laser beam. Losses due to atomic spontaneous transitions and to cavity decay are efficiently suppressed by employing fractional adiabatic passage and appropriately designed atom-field couplings. In this scheme the two atoms traverse the cavity-mode and the laser beam in opposite directions as opposed to other entanglement schemes in which the atoms are required to have fixed locations inside a cavity. We also show that the coherence …
We study the photon generation from arbitrary initial state in cavity QED due to the combined action of the anti-rotating term present in the Rabi Hamiltonian and Lindblad-type dephasing. We obtain a simple set of differential equations describing this process and deduce useful formulae for the moments of the photon number operator, demonstrating analytically that the average photon number increases linearly with time in the asymptotic limit.
The coupling of individual atoms to a high-finesse optical cavity is precisely controlled and adjusted using a standing-wave dipole-force trap, a challenge for strong atom-cavity coupling. Ultracold Rubidium atoms are first loaded into potential minima of the dipole trap in the center of the cavity. Then we use the trap as a conveyor belt that we set into motion perpendicular to the cavity axis. This allows us to repetitively move atoms out of and back into the cavity mode with a repositioning precision of 135 nm. This makes possible to either selectively address one atom of a string of atoms …
We propose two robust schemes to generate controllable (deterministic) atomic W-states of three three-level atoms interacting with an optical cavity and a laser beam. Losses due to atomic spontaneous emissions and to cavity decay are efficiently suppressed by employing adiabatic passage technique and appropriately designed atom-field couplings. In these schemes the three atoms traverse the cavity-mode and the laser beam and become entangled in the free space outside the cavity.
The resonant interaction between two two-level atoms and m- electromagnetic modes in a cavity is considered. Entanglement dynamics between two atoms is examined. In particular we compare dynamical variations for different cavity modes as well as for different cavity photon numbers. The collapse and revival of entanglement is exhibited by varying the atom-photon interaction times.
We consider the coherent state radiation field inside a micromaser cavity and study the entanglement mediated by it on a pair of two level atoms passing though the cavity one after the other. We then investigate the effects of squeezing of the cavity field on the atomic entanglement. We compute the entanglement of formation for the emerging mixed two-atom state and show that squeezing of the cavity radiation field can increase the atomic entanglement.
An optical field inside a Fabry-Perot cavity would exhibit multistability either when an atomic medium, acting as a classical dielectric, is filled into the cavity or when the cavity becomes optomechanical where one reflecting end becomes movable. An external laser is essential in both cases to drive the cavity mode out of the zero equilibrium state. We study the equilibrium states of an atom-filled optomechanical cavity, where the atoms are considered a collective two-level systems as well as an active component that replaces the role of the driving laser. Multistability is found when the ato…
We experimentally investigate the spin dynamics of one and two neutral atoms strongly coupled to a high finesse optical cavity. We observe quantum jumps between hyperfine ground states of a single atom. The interaction-induced normal mode splitting of the atom-cavity system is measured via the atomic excitation. Moreover, we observe evidence for conditional dynamics of two atoms simultaneously coupled to the cavity mode. Our results point towards the realization of measurement-induced entanglement schemes for neutral atoms in optical cavities.
We consider N identical two-level atoms coupled to an optical cavity, which is coherently driven by an external field. In the limit of small atomic excitation, the reflection and transmission coefficients for both fields and intensities are calculated analytically. In addition, the frequency content of the cavity field and hence also the emission spectrum of the cavity is determined. It is discussed in particular how individual collisional dephasing and common atomic energy-level fluctuations prevent the cavity field from being in a coherent state, which in turn affects the outgoing fields.
We propose a cavity-QED-based scheme of generating entanglement between atoms. The scheme is scalable to an arbitrary number of atoms, and can be used to generate a variety of multipartite entangled states such as the Greenberger-Horne-Zeilinger, W, and cluster states. Furthermore, with a role switching of atoms with photons, the scheme can be used to generate entanglement between cavity fields. We also introduce a scheme that can generate an arbitrary multipartite field graph state.
Between mirrors, the density of electromagnetic modes differs from the one in free space. This changes the radiation properties of an atom as well as the light forces acting on an atom. It has profound consequences in the strong-coupling regime of cavity quantum electrodynamics. For a single atom trapped inside the cavity, we investigate the atom-cavity system by scanning the frequency of a probe laser for various atom-cavity detunings. The avoided crossing between atom and cavity resonance is visible in the transmission of the cavity. It is also visible in the loss rate of the atom from the i…
A cavity-modified master equation is derived for a coherently driven, V-type three-level atom coupled to a single-mode cavity in the bad cavity limit. We show that population inversion in both the bare and dressed-state bases may be achieved, originating from the enhancement of the atom-cavity interaction when the cavity is resonant with an atomic dressed-state transition. The atomic populations in the dressed state representation are analysed in terms of the cavity-modified transition rates. The atomic fluorescence spectrum and probe absorption spectrum also investigated, and it is found that…
We prepare and detect the hyperfine state of a single 87Rb atom coupled to a fiber-based high finesse cavity on an atom chip. The atom is extracted from a Bose-Einstein condensate and trapped at the maximum of the cavity field, resulting in a reproducibly strong atom-cavity coupling. We use the cavity reflection and transmission signal to infer the atomic hyperfine state with a fidelity exceeding 99.92% in a read-out time of 100 microseconds. The atom is still trapped after detection.
We consider squeezing of one component of the collective spin vector of an atomic ensemble inside an optical cavity. The atoms interact with a cavity mode, and the squeezing is obtained by probing the state of the light field that is transmitted through the cavity. Starting from the stochastic master equation, we derive the time evolution of the state of the atoms and the cavity field, and we compute expectation values and variances of the atomic spin components and the quadratures of the cavity mode. The performance of the setup is compared to spin squeezing of atoms by probing of a light fie…
We analyze two configurations for laser cooling of neutral atoms whose internal states store qubits. The atoms are trapped in an optical lattice which is placed inside a cavity. We show that the coupling of the atoms to the damped cavity mode can provide a mechanism which leads to cooling of the motion without destroying the quantum information.
Multi-normal-mode splitting peaks are experimentally observed in a system with Doppler-broadened two-level atoms inside a relatively long optical cavity. In this system, the atoms-cavity interaction can reach the ``superstrong coupling" condition with atoms-cavity coupling strength $g\sqrt{N}$ to be near or larger than the cavity free-spectral range $Δ_{FSR}$. In such case, normal-mode splitting can occur in many cavity longitudinal modes to generate the multi-normal-mode splitting peaks, which can be well explained by the linear dispersion enhancement due to the largely increased atomic densi…
Individual laser cooled atoms are delivered on demand from a single atom magneto-optic trap to a high-finesse optical cavity using an atom conveyor. Strong coupling of the atom with the cavity field allows simultaneous cooling and detection of individual atoms for time scales exceeding 15 s. The single atom scatter rate is studied as a function of probe-cavity detuning and probe Rabi frequency, and the experimental results are in good agreement with theoretical predictions. We demonstrate the ability to manipulate the position of a single atom relative to the cavity mode with excellent control…
We study a special two-atom entanglement case in assumed Cavity QED experiment in which only one atom effectively exchanges a single photon with a cavity mode. We compute diatom entanglement under position-dependent atomic resonant dipole-dipole interaction (RDDI) for large interatomic separation limit. We show that the RDDI, even which is much smaller than the maximal atomic Rabi frequency, can induce distinct diatom entanglement. The peak entanglement (PE) reaches a maximum when RDDI strength can compare with the Rabi frequency of an atom.
The coherent evolution of the atom-cavity state in bimodal (cavity) experiments has been analyzed for a realistic time-dependence in detuning the atomic transition frequency. Apart from a `smooth switch' of the atomic resonance from one to the second mode of a bimodal cavity, we considered also an additional (effective) interaction between the field modes of the cavity, known as `communication channel'. Comparison of our model computations has been made especially with the measurements by Rauschenbeutel et al., [2001 Phys. Rev. A 64 050301] who demonstrated for the first time the entanglement …
I show a scheme which allows a perfect transfer of an unknown single-qubit atomic state from one atom to another by letting two atoms interact simultaneously with a cavity QED. During the interaction between atom and cavity, the cavity is only virtually excited and accordingly the scheme is insensitive to the cavity field states and cavity decay. Based on this scheme, a network for transfer of an arbitrary single-qubit atomic state between atoms is engineered. Then the scheme is generalized to perfectly transfer an arbitrary 2-qubit atomic state and accordingly a network for transfer of an arb…
We show that giant quasi-bound diatomic complexes, whose size is typically hundreds of nm, can be formed by intra-cavity cold diatom photoassociation or photodissociation in the strong atom-cavity coupling regime.
By integrating the techniques of laser cooling and trapping with those of cavity quantum electrodynamics (QED), single Cesium atoms have been trapped within the mode of a small, high finesse optical cavity in a regime of strong coupling. The observed lifetime for individual atoms trapped within the cavity mode is $τ\approx 28$ms, and is limited by fluctuations of light forces arising from the far-detuned intracavity field. This initial realization of trapped atoms in cavity QED should enable diverse protocols in quantum information science.
We study the evolution of quantum entanglement in double cavity systems. The entanglement of cavity atoms induced by entangled pair of photons is investigated. Both entanglement sudden death and entanglement sudden birth phenomena are shown to be existed and analyzed in detail. We also propose a strategy to enhance the entanglement between the atom in one cavity and the photon in another cavity by using quantum Zeno effect.
The entanglement characteristics including the so-called sudden death effect between two identical two-level atoms trapped in two separate cavities connected by an optical fiber are studied. The results show that the time evolution of entanglement is sensitive not only to the degree of entanglement of the initial state but also to the ratio between cavity-fiber coupling () and atom-cavity coupling (). This means that the entanglement dynamics can be controlled by choosing specific v and g.
We report on a combined experimental and theoretical investigation into the normal modes of an all-fiber coupled cavity-quantum-electrodynamics system. The interaction between atomic ensembles and photons in the same cavities, and that between the photons in these cavities and the photons in the fiber connecting these cavities, generates five non-degenerate normal modes. We demonstrate our ability to excite each normal mode individually. We study particularly the `cavity dark mode', in which the two cavities coupled directly to the atoms do not exhibit photonic excitation. Through the observat…
We study the quantum statistical properties of the collective excitations of an atomic ensemble inside a high-finesse cavity. In the large-detuning regime, it is found that the virtual photon exchange can induce a long-range interaction between atoms, which results in correlated excitations. In particular, the atomic blockade phenomenon occurs when the induced long-range interaction effectively suppresses the double atomic excitation, when the average photon number takes certain values, which makes the two nearest energy levels degenerate. We also show that quantum phase transitions occur in t…
We study the entanglement dynamics of strongly driven atoms off-resonantly coupled with cavity fields. We consider conditions characterized not only by the atom-field coupling but also by the atom-field detuning. By studying two different models within the framework of cavity QED, we show that the so-called atomic entanglement sudden death (ESD) always occurs if the atom-field coupling lager than the atom-field detuning, and is independent of the type of initial atomic state.
In a driven atom-cavity coupled system in which the two-level atom is driven by a classical field, the cavity mode which should be in a coherent state in the absence of its reservoir, can be squeezed by coupling to its reservoir. The squeezing effect is enhanced as the damping rate of the cavity is increased to some extent.
The single-photon transport in a single-mode waveguide, coupled to a cavity embedded with a two-leval atom is analyzed. The single-photon transmission and reflection amplitudes, as well as the cavity and the atom excitation amplitudes, are solved exactly via a real-space approach. It is shown that the dissipation of the cavity and of the atom respectively affects distinctively on the transport properties of the photons, and on the relative phase between the excitation amplitudes of the cavity mode and the atom.
We present results of numerical investigation of a microscopic dynamics of a two-level atom embedded into a ``linear crystal'' of other two-level atoms. These additional atoms play a role of a material media. All atoms interact with a multimode cavity field. We study how the decay of the initially excited atom is affected by the presence of material media and spectral properties of the cavity field.
We study the interaction of an atom with a quantum guided field in a weakly driven fiber-Bragg-grating (FBG) cavity. We present an effective Hamiltonian and derive the density-matrix equations for the combined atom-cavity system. We calculate the mean photon number, the second-order photon correlation function, and the atomic excited-state population. We show that, due to the confinement of the guided cavity field in the fiber cross-section plane and in the space between the FBG mirrors, the presence of the atom in the FBG cavity can significantly affect the mean photon number and the photon s…
We show that cavity-induced interference may result in spectral line narrowing in the absorption spectrum of a $Ξ$-type atom coupled to a single-mode, frequency-tunable cavity field with a pre-selected polarization at finite temperature.
We investigate a hybrid optomechanical system comprised of a mechanical oscillator and an atomic 3-level ensemble within an optical cavity. We show that a suitably tailored cavity field response via Electromagnetically Induced Transparency (EIT) in the atomic medium allows for strong coupling of the mechanical mirror oscillations to the collective atomic ground-state spin. This facilitates ground-state cooling of the mirror motion, quantum state mapping and robust atom-mirror entanglement even for cavity widths larger than the mechanical oscillator frequency.
The compatibility of cavity-generated spin-squeezed atomic states with atom-interferometric sensors that require freely falling atoms is demonstrated. An ensemble of $500,000$ spin-squeezed atoms in a high-finesse optical cavity with near-uniform atom-cavity coupling is prepared, released into free space, recaptured in the cavity, and probed. Up to $\sim$10 dB of metrologically-relevant squeezing is retrieved for 700 microsecond free-fall times, and decaying levels of squeezing are realized for up to 3 millisecond free-fall times. The degradation of squeezing results from loss of atom-cavity c…
In this paper we show that three cavity fields can be entangled when they are tuned on resonance with an ensemble of dressed three-level atoms. The master equation for the three cavity modes is derived by using atomic dressed states and the inseparability of the three output cavity modes is described by using a sufficient criterion proposed by van Loock and Furusawa. The physical cause is the atomic coherence effects, by which the quantum correlations are created in the field dynamics.
We show how the state of an atom trapped in a cavity can be teleported to a second atom trapped in a distant cavity simply by detecting photon decays from the cavities. This is a rare example of a decay mechanism playing a constructive role in quantum information processing. The scheme is comparatively easy to implement, requiring only the ability to trap a single three level atom in a cavity.
The energy-level structure of a single atom strongly coupled to the mode of a high-finesse optical cavity is investigated. The atom is stored in an intracavity dipole trap and cavity cooling is used to compensate for inevitable heating. Two well-resolved normal modes are observed both in the cavity transmission and the trap lifetime. The experiment is in good agreement with a Monte Carlo simulation, demonstrating our ability to localize the atom to within $λ/10$ at a cavity antinode.
When N driven atoms emit in phase into a high-Q cavity mode, the intracavity field generated by collective scattering interferes destructively with the pump driving the atoms. Hence atomic fluorescence is suppressed and cavity loss becomes the dominant decay channel for the whole ensemble. Microscopically 3D light-intensity minima are formed in the vicinity of the atoms that prevent atomic excitation and form a regular lattice. The effect gets more pronounced for large atom numbers, when the sum of the atomic decay rates exceeds the rate of cavity losses and one would expect the opposite behav…
A scheme for engineering quantum interference in a $Λ$-type atom coupled to a frequency-tunable, single-mode cavity field with a pre-selected polarization at finite temperature is proposed. Interference-assisted population trapping, population inversions and probe gain at one sideband of the Autler-Townes spectrum are predicted for certain cavity resonant frequencies.
We propose an experimental scheme for the measurement of entanglement between two two-level atoms. Our scheme requires one of the two entangled atoms to interact with a cavity field dispersively, and we show that by measuring the zero time-delay second-order coherence function of the cavity field, one can measure the concurrence of an arbitrary Bell-like atomic two-qubit state. As our scheme requires only one of the atoms to interact with the measured cavity, the entanglement quantification becomes independent of the location of the other atom. Therefore, our scheme can have important implicat…
We investigate a Bell-type inequality for probabilities of detected atoms formulated using atom-photon interactions in a cavity. We consider decoherence brought about by both atomic decay, as well as cavity photon loss, and study its quantitative action in diminishing the atom-field and the resultant atom-atom secondary correlations. We show that the effects of decoherence on nonlocality can be observed in a controlled manner in actual experiments involving the micromaser and also the microlaser.
We consider first a system of two enatangled cavities and a single two-level atom passing through one of them. A ``monogamy'' inequality for this tripartite system is quantitatively studied and verified in the presence of cavity leakage. We next consider the simultaneous passage of two-level atoms through both the cavities. Entanglement swapping is observed between the two-cavity and the two-atom system. Cavity dissipation leads to the quantitative reduction of information transfer though preserving the basic swapping property.
We study the entanglement properties of a pair of two-level atoms going through a cavity one after another. The initial joint state of two successive atoms that enter the cavity is unentangled. Interactions mediated by the cavity photon field result in the final two-atom state being of a mixed entangled type. We consider the field statistics of the Fock state field, and the thermal field, respectively, inside the cavity. The entanglement of formation of the joint two-atom state is calculated for both these cases as a function of the Rabi-angle $gt$. We present a comparitive study of two-atom e…
We demonstrate that, according to a recently suggested Lorentz-force approach to the Casimir effect, the vacuum force on an atom embedded in a material cavity differs substantially from the force on an atom of the cavity medium. The force on an embedded atom is of the familiar (van der Waals and Casimir-Polder) type, however, more strongly modified by the cavity medium than usually considered. The force on an atom of the cavity medium is of the medium-assisted force type with rather unusual properties, as demonstrated very recently [M. S. Tomas, Phys. Rev. A 71, 060101(R) (2005)]. This implies…
We study spontaneous emission of an atom near a nanofiber with two fiber-Bragg-grating (FBG) mirrors. We show that the coupling between the atom and the guided modes of the nanofiber can be significantly enhanced by the FBG cavity even when the cavity finesse is moderate. We find that, when the fiber radius is 200 nm and the cavity finesse is about 30, up to 94% of spontaneous emission from the atom can be channeled into the guided modes in the overdamped-cavity regime. We show numerically and analytically that vacuum Rabi oscillations and strong coupling can occur in the FBG cavity even when …
This paper is devoted to energy-spectral analysis for the system of a two-level atom coupled with photons in a cavity. It is shown that the Dicke-type energy level crossings take place when the atom-cavity interaction of the system undergoes changes between the weak coupling regime and the strong one. Using the phenomenon of the crossings we develop the idea of cavity-induced atom cooling proposed by the group of Ritsch, and we lay mathematical foundations of a possible mechanism for another superradiant cooling in addition to that proposed by Domokos and Ritsch. The process of our superradian…
We show that photon coincidence spectroscopy can provide an unambiguous signature of two atoms simultaneously interacting with a quantised cavity field mode. We also show that the single-atom Jaynes-Cummings model can be probed effectively via photon coincidence spectroscopy, even with deleterious contributions to the signal from two-atom events. In addition, we have explicitly solved the eigenvectors and eigenvalues of two two-level atoms coupled to a quantised cavity mode for differing coupling strengths.
Cavity-mediated cooling of the center--of--mass motion of a transversally, coherently pumped atom along the axis of a high--Q cavity is studied. The internal dynamics of the atomic dipole strongly coupled to the cavity field is treated by a non-perturbative quantum mechanical model, while the effect of the cavity on the external motion is described classically in terms of the analytically obtained linear friction and diffusion coefficients. Efficient cavity-induced damping is found which leads to steady-state temperatures well-below the Doppler limit. We reveal a mathematical symmetry between …
