• Accepted Paper

Interference-interaction engineering of excitation manifolds for selective multiphoton bundle emission

Jing Tang and Yuangang Deng

Phys. Rev. A - Accepted 14 October, 2026

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1103/tnrt-rm8c

Abstract

The controlled generation of nonclassical light beyond single photons remains a central challenge in quantum optics, due to the difficulty of enhancing multiphoton processes while suppressing lower-order excitations. Here we propose an interference-interaction-engineered scheme for programmable few-photon emission in a cavity-QED system of three atoms coupled to orthogonal cavity modes. By adiabatically eliminating an auxiliary Fabry-P'erot cavity, we generate a tunable cavity-mediated spin-exchange interaction χ. Combined with a controllable position-dependent phase ϕ, it reshapes the many-body dressed-state spectrum. Phase-controlled interference selectively addresses different excitation manifolds, whereas the cavity-mediated SEI enhances the spectral separation between neighboring manifolds, thereby stabilizing the selected excitation manifold and the corresponding photon-emission channel. For ϕ=0, constructive interference favors the low-excitation manifolds, yielding tunable single- and two-photon emission associated with the N=1 and N=2 manifolds. In contrast, for ϕ=2π/3, destructive interference suppresses lower-order excitation pathways and activates a resonant three-photon channel originating from the N=3 manifold. Importantly, the cavity-mediated interaction χ further reinforces the spectral isolation between neighboring manifolds, enabling a substantial improvement in multiphoton purity while maintaining a sizable photon population. We demonstrate a three-order-of-magnitude enhancement in two-photon purity and more than two orders of magnitude improvement in three-photon emission. Our results establish a unified interference-interaction framework in which effective optical nonlinearities can be programmably engineered through phase-controlled interference and cavity-mediated interactions, providing a scalable route toward high-purity multiphoton sources and programmable quantum photonic devices.

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