Vacuum Rabi oscillation

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A vacuum Rabi oscillation is a damped oscillation of an initially excited atom coupled to an electromagnetic resonator or cavity in which the atom alternately emits photon(s) into a single-mode electromagnetic cavity and reabsorbs them. The atom interacts with a single-mode field confined to a limited volume V in an optical cavity.[1][2][3] Spontaneous emission is a consequence of coupling between the atom and the vacuum fluctuations of the cavity field.

Mathematical treatment

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A mathematical description of vacuum Rabi oscillation begins with the Jaynes–Cummings model, which describes the interaction between a single mode of a quantized field and a two level system inside an optical cavity. The Hamiltonian for this model in the rotating wave approximation is

 

where   is the Pauli z spin operator for the two eigenstates   and   of the isolated two level system separated in energy by  ;   and   are the raising and lowering operators of the two level system;   and   are the creation and annihilation operators for photons of energy   in the cavity mode; and

 

is the strength of the coupling between the dipole moment   of the two level system and the cavity mode with volume   and electric field polarized along  . [4] The energy eigenvalues and eigenstates for this model are

 
 
 

where   is the detuning, and the angle   is defined as

 

Given the eigenstates of the system, the time evolution operator can be written down in the form

 

If the system starts in the state  , where the atom is in the ground state of the two level system and there are   photons in the cavity mode, the application of the time evolution operator yields

 

The probability that the two level system is in the excited state   as a function of time   is then

 

where   is identified as the Rabi frequency. For the case that there is no electric field in the cavity, that is, the photon number   is zero, the Rabi frequency becomes  . Then, the probability that the two level system goes from its ground state to its excited state as a function of time   is

 

For a cavity that admits a single mode perfectly resonant with the energy difference between the two energy levels, the detuning   vanishes, and   becomes a squared sinusoid with unit amplitude and period  

Generalization to N atoms

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The situation in which   two level systems are present in a single-mode cavity is described by the Tavis–Cummings model [5] , which has Hamiltonian

 

Under the assumption that all two level systems have equal individual coupling strength   to the field, the ensemble as a whole will have enhanced coupling strength  . As a result, the vacuum Rabi splitting is correspondingly enhanced by a factor of  .[6]

See also

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References and notes

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  1. ^ Hiroyuki Yokoyama & Ujihara K (1995). Spontaneous emission and laser oscillation in microcavities. Boca Raton: CRC Press. p. 6. ISBN 0-8493-3786-0.
  2. ^ Kerry Vahala (2004). Optical microcavities. Singapore: World Scientific. p. 368. ISBN 981-238-775-7.
  3. ^ Rodney Loudon (2000). The quantum theory of light. Oxford UK: Oxford University Press. p. 172. ISBN 0-19-850177-3.
  4. ^ Marlan O. Scully, M. Suhail Zubairy (1997). Quantum Optics. Cambridge University Press. p. 5. ISBN 0521435951.
  5. ^ Schine, Nathan (2019). Quantum Hall Physics with Photons (PhD). University of Chicago.
  6. ^ Mark Fox (2006). Quantum Optics: An Introduction. Boca Raton: OUP Oxford. p. 208. ISBN 0198566735.