Controlling the infrared vacuum field via molecular polaritons in the strong coupling regime

Johan Triana Universidad de Santiago de Chile

at 16:20for 20min

Johan F. Triana (a), Mauricio Arias (b), and Felipe Herrera (a,c)

(a) Departamento de Física, Universidad de Santiago de Chile, Santiago, Chile

(b) Departamento de Física, Universidad de Concepción, Concepción, Chile

The generation of non-classical light and optical phase control are two areas of intense research in quantum optics and nanophotonics. Although efforts have primarily focused on the optical regime, novel nanoscale devices offer new possibilities for studying quantum optical effects in the mid-infrared region.

We propose novel schemes for modifying the photon statistics of an electromagnetic field of an infrared Fabry-Pérot cavity by driving one cavity mirrors with ultrafast UV pulses that adiabatically modulate the cavity resonance frequency. Under strong coupling of the mid-infrared vacuum with molecular vibrations, we demonstrate that large modifications of the Mandel factor and squeezing parameter are possible by initializing the system in the ground and first excited polariton eigenstates [1].

For open cavities architectures such as nanoantennas with tip nanoprobes, we show that a new type of infrared blockade effect can be exploited to generate nonlinear coherent phase shift of the infrared near field, with the shift depending on the power of an ultrafast infrared driving pulse [2]. Our work opens new routes for designing infrared quantum devices with possible applications in quantum metrology, quantum information processing and quantum state preparation.

[1] J.F. Triana and F. Herrera, Ultrafast modulation of vibrational polaritons for controlling the quantum field statistics at mid-infrared frequencies, New J. Phys., 24, 023008 (2022)

[2] J. F. Triana, M. Arias, F. Herrera, et. al., Semi-empirical quantum optics for mid-infrared molecular nanophotonics, J. Chem. Phys., 156, 124110 (2022)