Preparation of an Exponentially Rising Optical Pulse for Efficient Excitation of Single Atoms in Free Space

TL;DR

This paper presents a straightforward method to generate exponentially rising optical pulses on nanosecond scales, enhancing the efficiency of exciting single atoms in free space using phase modulation and optical resonators.

Contribution

The authors introduce a novel, simple technique to produce exponentially rising optical pulses suitable for single-atom excitation, utilizing a fast transistor and electro-optical phase modulation.

Findings

Successfully generated nanosecond-scale exponentially rising pulses

Achieved efficient excitation of single Rb-87 atoms

Demonstrated practical implementation of pulse shaping method

Abstract

We report on a simple method to prepare optical pulses with exponentially rising envelope on the time scale of a few ns. The scheme is based on the exponential transfer function of a fast transistor, which generates an exponentially rising envelope that is transferred first on a radio frequency carrier, and then on a coherent cw laser beam with an electro-optical phase modulator (EOM). The temporally shaped sideband is then extracted with an optical resonator and can be used to efficiently excite a single Rb-87 atom.