TY - JOUR T1 - Observation of three-photon bound states in a quantum nonlinear medium JF - Science Y1 - 2018 A1 - Qi-Yu Liang A1 - Aditya V. Venkatramani A1 - Sergio H. Cantu A1 - Travis L. Nicholson A1 - Michael Gullans A1 - Alexey V. Gorshkov A1 - Jeff D. Thompson A1 - Cheng Chin A1 - Mikhail D. Lukin A1 - Vladan Vuletic AB -

Bound states of massive particles, such as nuclei, atoms or molecules, are ubiquitous in nature and constitute the bulk of the visible world around us. In contrast, photons typically only weakly influence each other due to their very weak interactions and vanishing mass. We report the observation of traveling three-photon bound states in a quantum nonlinear medium where the interactions between photons are mediated by atomic Rydberg states. In particular, photon correlation and conditional phase measurements reveal the distinct features associated with three-photon and two-photon bound states. Such photonic trimers and dimers can be viewed as quantum solitons with shape-preserving wavefunctions that depend on the constituent photon number. The observed bunching and strongly nonlinear optical phase are quantitatively described by an effective field theory (EFT) of Rydberg-induced photon-photon interactions, which demonstrates the presence of a substantial effective three-body force between the photons. These observations pave the way towards the realization, studies, and control of strongly interacting quantum many-body states of light.

VL - 359 U4 - 783-786 UR - http://science.sciencemag.org/content/359/6377/783 CP - 6377 U5 - 10.1126/science.aao7293 ER - TY - JOUR T1 - All-Optical Switch and Transistor Gated by One Stored Photon JF - Science Y1 - 2013 A1 - Wenlan Chen A1 - Kristin M. Beck A1 - Robert Bücker A1 - Michael Gullans A1 - Mikhail D. Lukin A1 - Haruka Tanji-Suzuki A1 - Vladan Vuletic AB - The realization of an all-optical transistor where one 'gate' photon controls a 'source' light beam, is a long-standing goal in optics. By stopping a light pulse in an atomic ensemble contained inside an optical resonator, we realize a device in which one stored gate photon controls the resonator transmission of subsequently applied source photons. A weak gate pulse induces bimodal transmission distribution, corresponding to zero and one gate photons. One stored gate photon produces fivefold source attenuation, and can be retrieved from the atomic ensemble after switching more than one source photon. Without retrieval, one stored gate photon can switch several hundred source photons. With improved storage and retrieval efficiency, our work may enable various new applications, including photonic quantum gates, and deterministic multiphoton entanglement. VL - 341 U4 - 768 - 770 UR - http://arxiv.org/abs/1401.3194v1 CP - 6147 J1 - Science U5 - 10.1126/science.1238169 ER - TY - JOUR T1 - Attractive Photons in a Quantum Nonlinear Medium JF - Nature (London) Y1 - 2013 A1 - Ofer Firstenberg A1 - Thibault Peyronel A1 - Qi-Yu Liang A1 - Alexey V. Gorshkov A1 - Mikhail D. Lukin A1 - Vladan Vuletic VL - 502 U4 - 71 UR - http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/nature12512 ER - TY - JOUR T1 - Fast Entanglement Distribution with Atomic Ensembles and Fluorescent Detection JF - Physical Review A Y1 - 2010 A1 - Jonatan B. Brask A1 - Liang Jiang A1 - Alexey V. Gorshkov A1 - Vladan Vuletic A1 - Anders S. Sorensen A1 - Mikhail D. Lukin AB - Quantum repeaters based on atomic ensemble quantum memories are promising candidates for achieving scalable distribution of entanglement over long distances. Recently, important experimental progress has been made towards their implementation. However, the entanglement rates and scalability of current approaches are limited by relatively low retrieval and single-photon detector efficiencies. We propose a scheme, which makes use of fluorescent detection of stored excitations to significantly increase the efficiency of connection and hence the rate. Practical performance and possible experimental realizations of the new protocol are discussed. VL - 81 UR - http://arxiv.org/abs/0907.3839v2 CP - 2 J1 - Phys. Rev. A U5 - 10.1103/PhysRevA.81.020303 ER - TY - JOUR T1 - Ultracold Cs$_2$ Feshbach Spectroscopy Y1 - 2003 A1 - Cheng Chin A1 - Vladan Vuletic A1 - Andrew J. Kerman A1 - Steven Chu A1 - Eite Tiesinga A1 - Paul J. Leo A1 - Carl J. Williams AB - We have observed and located more than 60 magnetic field-induced Feshbach resonances in ultracold collisions of ground-state $^{133}$Cs atoms. These resonances are associated with molecular states with up to four units of rotational angular momentum, and are detected through variations in the elastic, inelastic, and radiative collision cross sections. These observations allow us to greatly improve upon the interaction potentials between two cesium atoms and to reproduce the positions of most resonances to accuracies better than 0.5%. Based on the relevant coupling scheme between the electron spin, nuclear spin, and orbital angular momenta of the nuclei, quantum numbers and energy structure of the molecular states beneath the dissociation continuum are revealed. Finally, we predict the relevant collision properties for cesium Bose-Einstein condensation experiments. UR - http://arxiv.org/abs/cond-mat/0312613v2 ER -