Microcavities coupled to multilevel atoms

TL;DR

This paper investigates a three-level atom in a microcavity, revealing how the additional atomic state and control modes enable advanced optical control and sensing applications.

Contribution

It introduces a detailed analysis of a three-level atom coupled to a microcavity, highlighting new control schemes enabled by the third atomic state and mode interactions.

Findings

Third atomic state modifies system dynamics significantly.

Additional control modes enable optical switching and turnstile operations.

Potential for particle detection near the resonator surface.

Abstract

A three-level atom in the $\Lambda$-configuration coupled to a microcavity is studied. The two transitions of the atom are assumed couple to different counterpropagating mode pairs in the cavity. We analyze the dynamics both, in the strong-coupling and the bad cavity limit. We find that compared to a two-level setup, the third atomic state and the additional control field modes crucially modify the system dynamics and enable more advanced control schemes. All results are explained using appropriate dressed state and eigenmode representations. As potential applications, we discuss optical switching and turnstile operations and detection of particles close to the resonator surface.