Demonstration of Atomic Frequency Comb Memory for Light with Spin-Wave Storage

• We present a light-storage experiment in a praseodymium-doped crystal where the light is mapped onto an inhomogeneously broadened optical transition shaped into an atomic frequency comb. After absorption of the light, the optical excitation is converted into a spin-wave excitation by a control pulse. A second control pulse reads the memory (on-demand) by reconverting the spin-wave excitation to an optical one, where the comb structure causes a photon-echo-type rephasing of the dipole moments and directional retrieval of the light. This combination of photon-echo and spin-wave storage allows us to store submicrosecond (450 ns) pulses for up to 20 mu s. The scheme has a high potential for storing multiple temporal modes in the single-photon regime, which is an important resource for future long-distance quantum communication based on quantum repeaters.

Subject headings

NATURVETENSKAP  -- Fysik -- Atom- och molekylfysik och optik (hsv//swe)

NATURAL SCIENCES  -- Physical Sciences -- Atom and Molecular Physics and Optics (hsv//eng)

Publication and Content Type

art (subject category)

ref (subject category)