Observation of three-photon bound states in a quantum nonlinear medium
Abstract
Photons do not naturally interact with each other and must be coaxed into doing so. Liang et al. show that a gas of Rydberg atoms—a cloud of rubidium atoms excited by a sequence of laser pulses—can induce strong interactions between propagating photons. The authors could tune the strength of the interaction to make the photons form dimer and trimer bound states. This approach should prove useful for producing novel quantum states of light and quantum entanglement on demand.
Document Details
- Document Type
- Pub Defense Publication
- Publication Date
- Feb 16, 2018
- Source ID
- 10.1126/science.aao7293
Entities
People
- Aditya V Venkatramani
- Alexey V Gorshkov
- Cheng Chin
- Jeffrey D. Thompson
- Michael Gullans
- Mikhail Lukin
- Qi-Yu Liang
- Sergio H Cantu
- Travis L Nicholson
- Vladan Vuletić
Organizations
- Air Force Office of Scientific Research
- Alexander von Humboldt Foundation
- Harvard University
- Massachusetts Institute of Technology
- National Science Foundation
- Princeton University
- University of Chicago
- University of Maryland