Search

We report the realization of a superluminal laser in which the dip in the gain profile necessary for anomalous dispersion is produced via electromagnetically induced transparency caused by the optical pumping laser. This laser also creates the ground state population inversion necessary for generating Raman gain. Compared to a conventional Raman laser with similar operating parameters but without the dip in the gain profile, the spectral sensitivity of this approach is explicitly demonstrated to be enhanced by a factor of ∼12.7. Compared to an empty cavity, the peak value of the sensitivity enhancement factor under optimal operation parameters is inferred to be ∼360.

We show how to realize a slow-light enhanced accelerometer using a Mach-Zehnder Interferometer. A proof-of-principle experiment carried out with Rb vapor is found to produce results in close agreement with the theoretical model.

We report on the successful demonstration of PQ:PMMA transmission holograms with six channels for wavelength division multiplexing around 1550 nm with 2 nm channel spacings in a free-space optical communication system.

We realized superluminal Raman lasing via electromagnetically induced transparency. Compared to a conventional Raman laser with similar operating parameters, the spectral sensitivity of this approach is demonstrated to be enhanced by a factor of ~15.4.

A point source interferometer (PSI) is a device where atoms are split and recombined by applying a temporal sequence of Raman pulses. During the pulse sequence, an initially trapped cloud of cold atoms is released and allowed to expand, behaving approximately as a point source. The PSI can work as a sensitive multi-axes gyroscope that can automatically filter out the signal from accelerations. The phase shift arising from rotations is proportional to the momentum transferred to each atom from the Raman pulses. Therefore, by increasing the momentum transfer, it should be possibly to enhance the sensitivity of the PSI. Here, we investigate the degree of enhancement in sensitivity that could be achieved by augmenting the PSI with large momentum transfer (LMT) employing a sequence of many Raman pulses with alternating directions. Contrary to typical approaches used for describing a PSI, we employ a model under which the motion of the center of mass of each atom is described quantum mechanically. We show how increasing Doppler shifts lead to imperfections, thereby limiting the visibility of the signal fringes, and identify ways to suppress this effect by increasing the effective, two-photon Rabi frequencies of the Raman pulses. Considering the effect of spontaneous emission, we show that for a given value of the one-photon Rabi frequency, there is an optimum value for the number of pulses employed, beyond which the net enhancement in sensitivity begins to decrease. For a one-photon Rabi frequency of 200 MHz, for example, the peak value of the factor of enhancement in sensitivity is ~39, for a momentum transfer that is ~69 times as large as that for a conventional PSI. We also find that this peak value scales as the one-photon Rabi frequency to the power of 4/5.

In this paper, we present the experimental observation of simultaneous bi-directional superluminal lasing in a triangular ring cavity without gain competition and crosstalk as needed for realizing a gyroscope based on the Sagnac effect. The gain spectrum for each of the lasers is tailored to be a narrow dip on top of a broad gain using two stable isotopes of Rb. Specifically, we make use of 85Rb to produce a broad gain spectrum via the optically pumped Raman gain process and 87Rb to produce a narrow absorption spectrum via the optically pump Raman depletion process. A separate gain cell is used for the laser in each direction. Inferred from the simulation, the spectral sensitivity enhancements of the clock-wise and counter-clock-wise superluminal ring lasers are ∼362 and ∼505, respectively, with the imbalance attributed to differences in pump powers.

Phenanthrenequinone doped poly(methyl methacrylate) is a well-known holographic polymer used in many applications. It is important to consider the refractive index modulation (Δn) when designing a phase grating, as it heavily influences the diffraction efficiency. However, due to the behavior of the electric susceptibility in this material, the Δn will be different at varying reconstructed wavelengths. Here, we report on the observation of the difference in this modulation for various wavelengths. We develop a model for a two-level approximation of the electric susceptibility, based on the absorption spectrum of the material, to estimate the read wavelength dependence of the modulation for a given sample, and find our results to be in good agreement with this model.

Superatomic molecular orbitals (SAMOs) in C 60 are ideal building blocks for functional nanostructures. However, imaging them spatially in the gas phase has been unsuccessful. It is found experimentally that if C 60 is excited by an 800-nm laser, the photoelectron casts an anisotropic velocity image, but the image becomes isotropic if excited at a 400-nm wavelength. This diffuse image difference has been attributed to electron thermal ionization, but more recent experiments (800 nm) reveal a clear nondiffuse image superimposed on the diffuse image, whose origin remains a mystery. Here we show that the nondiffuse anisotropic image is the precursor of the f SAMOs. We predict that four 800-nm photons can directly access the 1f SAMO, and with one more photon, can image the orbital, with the photoelectron angular distribution having two maxima at 0° and 180° and two humps separated by 56.5°. Since two 400-nm photons only resonantly excite the spherical 1s SAMO and four 800-nm photons excite the anisotropic 1f SAMO, our finding gives a natural explanation of the nondiffuse image difference, complementing the thermal scenario.