Light transport in cold atoms: the fate of coherent backscattering in the weak localization regime

Abstract

The recent observation of coherent backscattering (CBS) of light by atoms has emphasized the key role of the velocity spread and of the quantum internal structure of the atoms. Firstly, using highly resonant scatterers imposes very low temperatures of the disordered medium in order to keep the full contrast of the CBS interference. This criterion is usually achieved with standard laser cooling techniques. Secondly, a non trivial internal atomic structure leads to a dramatic decrease of the CBS contrast. Experiments with Rubidium atoms (with a non trivial internal structure) and with Strontium (with the simplest possible internal structure) show this behaviour and confirm theoretical calculations.

References in corpus (2)

• Coherent light transport in a cold Strontium cloud
• Weak localization of light by cold atoms: the impact of quantum internal structure

Cited by in corpus (5)

• Saturation induced coherence loss in coherent backscattering of light
• Coherent backscattering of light from ultracold and optically dense atomic ensembles
• Coherent backscattering of light by atoms in the saturated regime
• Light transport in cold atoms and thermal decoherence
• Thermal breakdown of coherent backscattering: a case study of quantum duality