Bistable reflection and beam shifts with excitation of surface plasmons in a saturable absorbing medium.

We investigate the nonlinear reflection of a light beam from a Kretschmann configuration with saturable absorbing medium. The absorption of medium has direct influence on the intrinsic loss of the system, thus affecting the reflectivity and the phase variation when the surface plasmons are resonantly excited. As the incident power changes, the reflectivity can be switched between high and low values and exhibits absorptive optical bistability as a result of the inherent positive feedback by the intensity-dependent saturation effect. The Goos-Hänchen and the Imbert-Fedorov shifts of the reflected beam have the same bistable behavior as the reflectance. The effects of the thickness of metal film and the linear absorption coefficient on the hysteresis loop are analyzed in detail by considering the system losses and the saturated absorption. The bistable reflection and beam shifts may have applications in all-optical devices, such as optical switching.

Tunable and enhanced Goos-Hänchen shift via surface plasmon resonance assisted by a coherent medium.

We present a scheme for enhancing Goos-Hänchen shift of light beam that is reflected from a coherent atomic medium in the Kretschmann-Raether configuration. The complex permittivity of the medium can be coherently controlled and has significant influence on the surface plasmon resonance (SPR) at the metal-medium interface. By tuning the atomic absorption, the internal damping of SPR system can be modulated effectively, thereby leading to giant positive and negative lateral displacements. The refractive index of medium determines the SPR angle. Thus the peak position of the beam shift becomes tunable. As the optical response of the coherent medium depends on the intensity and detuning of the controlling fields, we are able to conveniently manipulate the magnitude, the sign, and the angular position of Goos-Hänchen shift peaks.

Parity-time symmetry in coherent asymmetric double quantum wells.

A coherently prepared asymmetric double semiconductor quantum well (QW) is proposed to realize parity-time (PT) symmetry. By appropriately tuning the laser fields and the pertinent QW parameters, PT-symmetric optical potentials are obtained by three different methods. Such a coherent QW system is reconfigurable and controllable, and it can generate new approaches of theoretically and experimentally studying PT-symmetric phenomena.

Asymmetric light diffraction of two-dimensional electromagnetically induced grating with PT symmetry in asymmetric double quantum wells.

An asymmetric double semiconductor quantum well is proposed to realize two-dimensional parity-time (PT) symmetry and an electromagnetically induced grating. In such a nontrivial grating with PT symmetry, the incident probe photons can be diffracted to selected angles depending on the spatial relationship of the real and imaginary parts of the refractive index. Such results are due to the interference mechanism between the amplitude and phase of the grating and can be manipulated by the probe detuning, modulation amplitudes of the standing wave fields, and interaction length of the medium. Such a system may lead to new approaches of observing PT-symmetry-related phenomena and has potential applications in photoelectric devices requiring asymmetric light transport using semiconductor quantum wells.

Beam splitter and router via an incoherent pump-assisted electromagnetically induced blazed grating.

We propose a scheme for a beam splitter and a beam router via an electromagnetically induced blazed grating in a four-level double-Λ system driven by an intensity-modulated coupling field and an incoherent pump field. The blazed grating relies on the incoherent pump process, which helps in inducing large refractivity with suppressed absorption or even gain. Consequently, the weak probe beam can be effectively deflected with high diffraction efficiency, and, meanwhile, its energy is amplified. When using an intensity mask with two symmetric domains in the coupling field, the presented blazed grating provides the possibility of a symmetric beam splitter. The diffraction efficiency and diffraction order of the gratings are sensitive to the intensity of the coupling field, and, thus, the gratings can function as a tunable asymmetric beam splitter or a beam router, which distributes the probe field into different spatial directions. Therefore, the proposed scheme may have potential applications in optical communication and networking.

Creation and Transfer of Coherence via Technique of Stimulated Raman Adiabatic Passage in Triple Quantum Dots.

We propose a scheme for creation and transfer of coherence among ground state and indirect exciton states of triple quantum dots via the technique of stimulated Raman adiabatic passage. Compared with the traditional stimulated Raman adiabatic passage, the Stokes laser pulse is replaced by the tunneling pulse, which can be controlled by the externally applied voltages. By varying the amplitudes and sequences of the pump and tunneling pulses, a complete coherence transfer or an equal coherence distribution among multiple states can be obtained. The investigations can provide further insight for the experimental development of controllable coherence transfer in semiconductor structure and may have potential applications in quantum information processing.

Standoff two-color quantum ghost imaging through turbulence.

Recently, a two-color quantum ghost imaging configuration was proposed by Karmakar et al. [Phys. Rev. A81, 033845 (2010)]. By illuminating an object located far away from the source and detector, with a signal beam of long wavelength to avoid absorption of short wavelengths in the atmosphere while a reference beam of short wavelength is detected locally, this imaging configuration can be appropriate for standoff sensing. In practice, the signal beam must propagate through atmosphere in the presence of serious turbulence. We analyzed theoretically the performance of this ghost imaging configuration through turbulence. Based on the Gaussian state source model and extended Huygens-Fresnel integral, a formula is derived to depict the ghost image formed through turbulence of a standoff reflective object. Numerical calculations are also given according to the formula. The results show that the image quality will be degraded by the turbulence, but the resolution can be improved by means of optimizing the wavelengths of the reference and signal beams even when the turbulence is very serious.

Two-dimensional sub-half-wavelength atom localization via controlled spontaneous emission.

We propose a scheme for two-dimensional (2D) atom localization based on the controlled spontaneous emission, in which the atom interacts with two orthogonal standing-wave fields. Due to the spatially dependent atom-field interaction, the position probability distribution of the atom can be directly determined by measuring the resulting spontaneously emission spectrum. The phase sensitive property of the atomic system leads to quenching of the spontaneous emission in some regions of the standing-waves, which significantly reduces the uncertainty in the position measurement of the atom. We find that the frequency measurement of the emitted light localizes the atom in half-wavelength domain. Especially the probability of finding the atom at a particular position can reach 100% when a photon with certain frequency is detected. By increasing the Rabi frequencies of the driving fields, such 2D sub-half-wavelength atom localization can acquire high spatial resolution.

Controlled light-pulse propagation via dynamically induced double photonic band gaps.

We analyze the optical response of a standing-wave driven four-level atomic system with double dark resonances. Fully developed double photonic band gaps arise as a result of periodically modulated refractive index within the two electromagnetically induced transparency widows. We anticipate that the dynamically induced band gaps can be used to coherently control the propagation of light-pulses with different center frequencies and may have applications in all-optical switching and routing for quantum information networks.

Transmission and reflection of electromagnetically induced absorption grating in homogeneous atomic media.

We theoretically study the transmission and reflection of the probe travelling wave in an electromagnetically induced absorption grating (EIG), which is created in a three-level Lambda-type atomic system when the coupling field is a standing wave. Using the system, we show that a photonic stop band can exist on one side away from the resonance point in ultracold atomic gas, while there is an enhanced absorption at resonance and small reflection around it in the thermal atomic gas. Because our method can deal with such two cases, it is helpful to further understand the effects of the Doppler effect on atomic coherence and interference.