Light scattering by ultracold atoms in an optical lattice
Abstract
We investigate theoretically light scattering of photons by ultracold atoms in an optical lattice in the linear regime. A full quantum theory for the atom-photon interactions is developed as a function of the atomic state in the lattice along the Mott-insulator-superfluid phase transition, and the photonic-scattering cross section is evaluated as a function of the energy and of the direction of emission. The predictions of this theory are compared with the theoretical results of a recent work on Bragg scattering in time-of-flight measurements [A.M. Rey , Phys. Rev. A 72, 023407 (2005)]. We show that, when performing Bragg spectroscopy with light scattering, the photon recoil gives rise to an additional atomic site-to-site hopping, which can interfere with ordinary tunneling of matter waves and can significantly affect the photonic-scattering cross section.
- Publication:
-
Physical Review A
- Pub Date:
- January 2010
- DOI:
- 10.1103/PhysRevA.81.013404
- arXiv:
- arXiv:0904.0915
- Bibcode:
- 2010PhRvA..81a3404R
- Keywords:
-
- 37.10.Jk;
- 42.50.-p;
- 03.75.Lm;
- 37.10.Vz;
- Atoms in optical lattices;
- Quantum optics;
- Tunneling Josephson effect Bose-Einstein condensates in periodic potentials solitons vortices and topological excitations;
- Mechanical effects of light on atoms molecules and ions;
- Quantum Physics;
- Condensed Matter - Quantum Gases
- E-Print:
- 13 pages, 6 fig, (accepted in PRA)