https://doi.org/10.1007/s100530050591
Saturation of the weak probe amplification in a strongly driven cold and dense atomic cloud
Department of Physics of Complex Systems,
Weizmann Institute of Science, Rehovot 76100, Israel
Received:
3
November
1998
Revised:
5
March
1999
Published online: 15 October 1999
We present an experimental and theoretical investigation of the weak probe amplification in a cold and optically thick atomic cloud that is highly driven by a strong pump laser. We find that for high optical densities the probe amplification is strongly saturated. We compare our saturation measurements with a model based on dressed-atom population equalization due to re-scattering of spontaneous emission. Good agreement between theory and experiment is obtained only when corrections due to multiple scattering are included.
PACS: 32.80.Pj – Optical cooling of atoms, trapping / 32.80.-t – Photon interactions with atoms / 32.50.+d – Fluorescence, phosphorescence (including quenching)
© EDP Sciences, Società Italiana di Fisica, Springer-Verlag, 1999
