Photonic-band-gap properties for two-component slow light

Abstract

We consider two-component "spinor" slow light in an ensemble of atoms coherently driven by two pairs of counterpropagating control laser fields in a double tripod-type linkage scheme. We derive an equation of motion for the spinor slow light (SSL) representing an effective Dirac equation for a massive particle with the mass determined by the two-photon detuning. By changing the detuning the atomic medium acts as a photonic crystal with a controllable band gap. If the frequency of the incident probe light lies within the band gap, the light tunnels through the sample. For frequencies outside the band gap, the transmission probability oscillates with increasing length of the sample. In both cases the reflection takes place into the complementary mode of the probe field. We investigate the influence of the finite excited state lifetime on the transmission and reflection coefficients of the probe light. We discuss possible experimental implementations of the SSL using alkali atoms such as Rubidium or Sodium.

Superluminal two-color light in a multiple Raman gain medium

“…In this work we consider a different concept where superluminal light is achieved for the superposition of probe fields at different frequencies. The formation of such coupled optical fields (spinor light) was first analyzed in [27,28]. Here, we demonstrate that similar spinor properties can also be achieved in the case of fast light.…”

Slow, Stored and Stationary Light

“…If the two types of spin excitations are coupled to each other in the right way, two-component slow light is formed which has a more complex structure resembling what is known in quantum physics as a particle with a spin degree of freedom [22][23][24][25]. This is like having two types of racing cars going in opposite directions, each pulling different types of .…”

“…15.20c. Two-component stationary light can be implemented using a tripod [23] or a double-tripod [24] atom-light coupling scheme, the latter shown in . Fig.…”

Electromagnetically induced transparency and nonlinear pulse propagation in a combined tripod and Λ atom-light coupling scheme

“…There has been a considerable amount of activities on single- [2-4, 8, 11, 12, 39-43] and two-component (spinor) [6,[44][45][46][47][48] slow light in atomic media induced by the EIT. The former single-complonent slow light involves a probe beam of light and one or several control beams resonantly interacting with atomic media characterized by three level Lambda (Λ) type [2,40] or four level tripod type [41,42,[49][50][51] atom-light coupling schemes.…”

“…The former single-complonent slow light involves a probe beam of light and one or several control beams resonantly interacting with atomic media characterized by three level Lambda (Λ) type [2,40] or four level tripod type [41,42,[49][50][51] atom-light coupling schemes. In the later (spinor) case, double-tripod (DT) [6,[44][45][46][47][48] coupling schemes have been considered to support a simultaneous propagation of two probe beams leading to formation of a two-component slow light.…”