Laser induced atomic coherence and interference in cold atoms
Article
Yan, M, Rickey, EG, Zhu, Y. (2001). Laser induced atomic coherence and interference in cold atoms
. JOURNAL OF THE CHINESE CHEMICAL SOCIETY, 48(3), 301-308. 10.1002/jccs.200100047
Yan, M, Rickey, EG, Zhu, Y. (2001). Laser induced atomic coherence and interference in cold atoms
. JOURNAL OF THE CHINESE CHEMICAL SOCIETY, 48(3), 301-308. 10.1002/jccs.200100047
We report experimental studies of electromagnetically induced transparency and enhancement of third-order optical nonlinearities in Λ-type atomic systems realized in 87Rb atoms cooled and confined in a magneto-optical trap. We observed complete transparency of a weak probe laser in the Λ type Rb system with a moderate coupling field. With a third pump laser tuned to a fourth atomic state, the atomic system exhibits the interference-enhanced third-order susceptibility and only absorbs two photons, but not one photon. Our experiment demonstrates large nonlinear absorption of the weak probe laser, from which greatly enhanced Kerr nonlinearity in the Rb system is inferred.
