Theory of Dipole Induced Electromagnetic Transparency

TL;DR

This paper develops a comprehensive theory for dipole-induced electromagnetic transparency in dense vapors of multi-level quantum emitters, revealing narrow transparency windows caused by overlapping resonances and enhanced dipole interactions, with applications in slow light and pulse shaping.

Contribution

It extends the understanding of electromagnetic transparency to multilevel systems and provides a theoretical framework for dense atomic vapors exhibiting this phenomenon.

Findings

Narrow transparency windows appear at high densities due to overlapping resonances.

Rb-85 atoms can behave as three-level systems exhibiting transparency at high densities.

Potential applications include slow light and laser pulse shaping.

Abstract

A detailed theory describing linear optics of vapors comprised of interacting multi-level quantum emitters is proposed. It is shown both by direct integration of Maxwell-Bloch equations and using a simple analytical model that at large densities narrow transparency windows appear in otherwise completely opaque spectra. The existence of such windows is attributed to overlapping resonances. This effect, first introduced for three-level systems in [R. Puthumpally-Joseph, M. Sukharev, O. Atabek and E. Charron, Phys. Rev. Lett. 113, 163603 (2014)], is due to strongly enhanced dipole-dipole interactions at high emitters' densities. The presented theory extends this effect to the case of multilevel systems. The theory is applied to the D1 transitions of interacting Rb-85 atoms. It is shown that at high atomic densities, Rb-85 atoms can behave as three-level emitters exhibiting all the properties of dipole induced electromagnetic transparency. Applications including slow light and laser pulse shaping are also proposed.