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  • Open Access

Engineering of spontaneous emission in free space via conditional measurements

Manuel Bojer1,*, Lukas Götzendörfer1, Romain Bachelard2,3, and Joachim von Zanthier1

  • 1Institut für Optik, Information und Photonik, Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg, 91058 Erlangen, Germany
  • 2Université Côte d'Azur, CNRS, Institut de Physique de Nice, 06560 Valbonne, France
  • 3Departamento de Física, Universidade Federal de São Carlos, Rodovia Washington Luís, km 235-SP-310, 13565-905 São Carlos, São Paulo, Brazil

  • *manuelbojer6@gmail.com
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Phys. Rev. Research 4, 043022 – Published 11 October, 2022

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevResearch.4.043022

Abstract

We study the collective spontaneous emission of three identical two-level atoms initially prepared in the excited states by measuring Glauber's third-order photon correlation function. Assuming two atoms at subwavelength distance from each other such that they are subject to the dipole-dipole interaction while the third one is located several wavelengths away, we observe super- and subradiant decay alike, depending on the direction of observation. Unlike the case where no remote atom is introduced or no conditional measurements are performed, the spontaneous emission behavior of the conditioned three-atom system is strongly modified, i.e., differing from the single-atom and the canonical two-atom configuration. The conditional measurements associated with the three-photon correlation function in combination with the dipole-dipole interaction between the adjacent atoms lead to quantum interference among the different decay channels allowing one to engineer the spontaneous emission in space and time.

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Phys. Rev. Research 4, 043022– Published 11 October, 2022
  • Received 5 April 2022
  • Accepted 29 August 2022
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Published by the American Physical Society under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International license. Further distribution of this work must maintain attribution to the author(s) and the published article's title, journal citation, and DOI.

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