State preparation by optical pumping in erbium-doped solids using stimulated emission and spin mixing

Lauritzen, Bjorn; Hastings-Simon, S. R.; de Riedmatten, Hugues; Afzelius, Mikael; Gisin, Nicolas

doi:10.1103/PhysRevA.78.043402

Scientific article

English

State preparation by optical pumping in erbium-doped solids using stimulated emission and spin mixing

Contributors

Lauritzen, Bjorn; Hastings-Simon, S. R.; de Riedmatten, Hugues; Afzelius, Mikael

; Gisin, Nicolas

Published in

Physical review, A, Atomic, molecular, and optical physics, vol. 78, no. 4, p. 043402-1/9

Publication date

2008

Abstract

Erbium-doped solids are potential candidates for the realization of a quantum memory for photons at telecommunication wavelengths. The implementation of quantum memory proposals in rare-earth-ion-doped solids require spectral tailoring of the inhomogeneous absorption profile by efficient population transfer between ground-state levels (spin polarization) using optical pumping. In this paper we investigate the limiting factors of efficient optical pumping between ground-state Zeeman levels in an erbium-doped Y2SiO5 crystal. We introduce two methods to overcome these limiting factors: stimulated emission using a second laser and spin mixing using radio frequency excitation. Both methods significantly improve the degree of spin polarization. Population transfer between two Zeeman levels with less than 10% of the total population in the initial ground state is achieved, corresponding to a spin polarization greater than 90%. In addition, we demonstrate spectral tailoring by isolating a narrow absorption peak within a large transparency window.

UNIGE affiliation entities

Faculté des sciences / Section de physique / Groupe de physique appliquée

Citation (ISO format)

LAURITZEN, Bjorn et al. State preparation by optical pumping in erbium-doped solids using stimulated emission and spin mixing. In: Physical review, A, Atomic, molecular, and optical physics, 2008, vol. 78, n° 4, p. 043402–1/9. doi: 10.1103/PhysRevA.78.043402

Article (Published version)

Identifiers

PID : unige:11682
DOI : 10.1103/PhysRevA.78.043402

Journal ISSN

1050-2947

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27/08/2010 09:27:00

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29/10/2024 17:04:41

State preparation by optical pumping in erbium-doped solids using stimulated emission and spin mixing

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Published in

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Abstract

UNIGE affiliation entities

Citation (ISO format)

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First validation

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