Field control of single x-ray photons in nuclear forward scattering

Abstract

Means to coherently control single x-ray photons in resonant scattering of light off nuclei by electric or magnetic fields are investigated theoretically. In order to derive the time response in nuclear forward scattering, we adapt the Maxwell-Bloch equations known from quantum optics to describe the resonant light pulse propagation through a nuclear medium. Two types of time-dependent perturbations of nuclear forward scattering are considered for coherent control of the resonantly scattered x-ray quanta. First, the simultaneous coherent propagation of two pulses through the nuclear sample is addressed. We find that the signal of a weak pulse can be enhanced or suppressed by a stronger pulse simultaneously propagating through the sample in counter-propagating geometry. Second, the effect of a time-dependent hyperfine splitting is investigated and we put forward a scheme that allows parts of the spectrum to be shifted forward in time. This is the inverse effect of coherent photon storage and may become a valuable technique if single x-ray photon wavepackets are to become the information carriers in future photonic circuits.

21 pages, 10 figures, v2 minor modifications in text to match the published version, results unchanged

References in corpus (11)

• Silica-on-Silicon Waveguide Quantum Circuits
• Coherent Control of the Waveforms of Recoilless Gamma-Photons
• Stationary Light Pulses in Cold Atomic Media
• Stationary Light Pulses without Bragg Gratings
• Vacuum-assisted generation and control of atomic coherences at x-ray energies
• Single-Photon Entanglement in the keV Regime via Coherent Control of Nuclear Forward Scattering
• Coherent storage and phase modulation of single hard x-ray photons using nuclear excitons
• Coherence-enhanced optical determination of the ${}^{229}$Th isomeric transition
• A three-beam setup for coherently controlling nuclear state population
• Proposed Entanglement of X-ray Nuclear Polaritons as a Potential Method for Probing Matter at the Subatomic Scale
• Two-Pulse Propagation in Media with Quantum-Mixed Ground States

Cited by in corpus (12)

• Stopping narrow-band x-ray pulses in nuclear media
• Quantum enhanced X-ray detection
• Green function formalism for resonant interaction of x-rays with nuclei in structured media
• Optomechanically induced transparency of x-rays via optical control
• All-Electromagnetic Control of Broadband Quantum Excitations Using Gradient Photon Echoes
• Transient nuclear inversion by X-Ray Free Electron Laser in a tapered x-ray waveguid
• Collective effects in ${}^{229}$Th-doped crystals
• Conversion of recoilless gamma-radiation into a periodic sequence of ultrashort pulses in a set of dispersive and absorptive resonant media
• Time-Delayed Magnetic Control and Narrowing of X-Ray frequency Spectra in Two-Target Nuclear Forward Scattering
• X-ray-frequency modulation via periodic switching of an external magnetic field
• Storage and manipulation of single x-ray photons via nuclear hyperfine splitting
• Excitation of narrow x-ray transitions in thin-film cavities by focused pulses