A Single Atom as a Mirror of an Optical Cavity
a) Single ion+mirror set-up. The probe feld is coupled to the atom-mirror cavity through the dielectric mirror that is mounted on piezo stages.The intensity of the probe is measured in transmission by PMT1 and in reflection by PMT2. PMT3 is used for measuring the ion fluorescence.The main properties of the single atom operated as a mirror are shown in b): positioning, c): central frequency and d):transmission, as measured without the dielectric mirror.
By tightly focussing a laser eld onto a single cold ion trapped in front of a far-distant dielectric mirror, we could observe a quantum electrodynamic e ect whereby the ion behaves as the optical mirror of a Fabry-Perot cavity. We show that the amplitude of the laser eld is signi cantly altered due to a modi cation of the electromagnetic mode structure around the atom in a novel regime in which the laser intensity is already changed by the atom alone. We propose a direct application of this system as a quantum memory for single photons….
Read more: news.sciencemag.org – arxiv.org
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