Light propagation in atomic Mott Insulators

F. Bariani; I. Carusotto

doi:10.2971/jeos.2008.08005

Journal of the European Optical Society - Rapid publications, Vol 3 (2008)

Light propagation in atomic Mott Insulators

F. Bariani, I. Carusotto

Abstract

We study radiation-matter interaction in a system of ultracold atoms trapped in an optical lattice in a Mott insulator phase. We develop a fully general quantum model, and we perform calculations for a one-dimensional geometry at normal incidence. Both two- and three-level $\Lambda$ atomic configurations are studied. The polariton dispersion and the reflectivity spectra are characterized in the different regimes, for both semi-infinite and finite-size geometries. We apply this model to propose a photon energy lifter experiment: a device which is able to shift the carrier frequency of a slowly travelling wavepacket without affecting the pulse shape nor its coherence.

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