skip to main content


Title: Compression of the Synchrotron Mössbauer X-ray Photon Waveform in an Oscillating Resonant Absorber
A technique to transform the waveform of a 14.4 keV photon (time dependence of the photon detection probability or, equivalently, the intensity of the single-photon wave packet) into a regular sequence of short, nearly bandwidth-limited pulses with a controlled number of pulses is proposed. It is based on coherent forward scattering of single X-ray photons from a synchrotron Mössbauer source (SMS) in an optically thick, vibrating, recoilless 57Fe resonant absorber. The possibility of compressing the waveform of an SMS photon into a single short bell-shaped pulse is predicted. The experiment is proposed for compressing a 100 ns duration 14.4 keV single-photon wave packet produced by SMS at the European Synchrotron Radiation Facility (ESRF) into a single bell-shaped pulse of less than 20 ns duration and more than twice the peak intensity. Such single-photon coherent pulses are promising for applications in the fast-developing field of X-ray quantum optics, including possible implementation of quantum memory.  more » « less
Award ID(s):
2012194
NSF-PAR ID:
10447161
Author(s) / Creator(s):
; ;
Date Published:
Journal Name:
Photonics
Volume:
9
Issue:
11
ISSN:
2304-6732
Page Range / eLocation ID:
829
Format(s):
Medium: X
Sponsoring Org:
National Science Foundation
More Like this
  1. Abstract Recently, an observation of acoustically induced transparency (AIT) of a stainless-steel foil for resonant 14.4-keV photons from a radioactive 57 Co Mössbauer source due to collective uniform oscillations of atomic nuclei was reported [Phys Rev Lett 124,163602, 2020]. In this paper, we propose to use the steep resonant dispersion of the absorber within the AIT spectral window to dramatically reduce a propagation velocity of γ-ray and x-ray photons. In particular, we show that a significant fraction (more than 40%) of a 97-ns γ-ray single-photon wave packet from a 57 Co radioactive source can be slowed down up to 3 m/s and delayed by 144 ns in a 57 Fe-enriched stainless-steel foil at room temperature. We also show that a similarly significant slowing down up to 24 m/s and a delay by 42 ns can be achieved for more than 70% of the 100-ns 14.4-keV x-ray single-photon pulse from a synchrotron Mössbauer source available at European Synchrotron Radiation Facility (ESRF) and Spring-8 facility. The propagation velocity can be widely controlled by changing the absorber vibration frequency. Achieving the propagation velocity on the order of 1–50 m/s would set a record in the hard x-ray range, comparable to what was obtained in the optical range. 
    more » « less
  2. A dual color, frequency and pulse duration agile laser system, capable of delivering laser pulses in arbitrary temporal profiles with ∼1 ns to ∼1 µs pulse duration, chirping rates of ∼27 MHz/ns with an achievable chirping range of several GHz across the pulse duration, and with energies ranging from a few nJ to hundreds of mJ per pulse has been developed. The flexibility and capability of this laser system provide a wide range of laser parameters that can be exploited to optimize operational conditions in various experiments ranging from laser diagnostics to spectroscopy and optical manipulation of matter. The developed system is successfully demonstrated to obtain coherent Rayleigh-Brillouin scattering (CRBS) in both single and dual color configuration, in an effort to expand the non-intrusive accessibility towards lower pressure regime for neutral gas and plasma diagnostics.

     
    more » « less
  3. Short-pulse ion beams have been developed in recent years and now enable applications in materials science. A tunable flux of selected ions delivered in pulses of a few nanoseconds can affect the balance of defect formation and dynamic annealing in materials. We report results from color center formation in silicon with pulses of 900 keV protons. G-centers in silicon are near-infrared photon emitters with emerging applications as single-photon sources and for spin-photon qubit integration. G-centers consist of a pair of substitutional carbon atoms and one silicon interstitial atom and are often formed by carbon ion implantation and thermal annealing. Here, we report on G-center formation with proton pulses in silicon samples that already contained carbon, without carbon ion implantation or thermal annealing. The number of G-centers formed per proton increased when we increased the pulse intensity from 6.9 × 109 to 7.9 × 1010 protons/cm2/pulse, demonstrating a flux effect on G-center formation efficiency. We observe a G-center ensemble linewidth of 0.1 nm (full width half maximum), narrower than previously reported. Pulsed ion beams can extend the parameter range available for fundamental studies of radiation-induced defects and the formation of color centers for spin-photon qubit applications. 
    more » « less
  4. Abstract

    The induced transparency of opaque medium for resonant electromagnetic radiation is a powerful tool for manipulating the field-matter interaction. Various techniques to make different physical systems transparent for radiation from microwaves to x-rays were implemented. Most of them are based on the modification of the quantum-optical properties of the medium under the action of an external coherent electromagnetic field. Recently, an observation of acoustically induced transparency (AIT) of the57Fe absorber for resonant 14.4-keV photons from the radioactive57Co source was reported. About 150-fold suppression of the resonant absorption of photons due to collective acoustic oscillations of the nuclei was demonstrated. In this paper, we extend the AIT phenomenon to a novel phase-locked regime, when the transmitted photons are synchronized with the absorber vibration. We show that the advantages of synchrotron Mössbauer sources such as the deterministic periodic emission of radiation and controlled spectral-temporal characteristics of the emitted photons along with high-intensity photon flux in a tightly focused beam, make it possible to efficiently implement this regime, paving the way for the development of the acoustically controlled interface between hard x-ray photons and nuclear ensembles.

     
    more » « less
  5. Abstract

    High-quality sources of single photons are of paramount importance for quantum communication, sensing, and metrology. To these ends, resonantly excited two-level systems based on self-assembled quantum dots have recently generated widespread interest. Nevertheless, we have recently shown that for resonantly excited two-level systems, emission of a photon during the presence of the excitation laser pulse and subsequent re-excitation results in a degradation of the obtainable single-photon purity. Here, we demonstrate that generating single photons from self-assembled quantum dots with a scheme based on two-photon excitation of the biexciton strongly suppresses the re-excitation. Specifically, the pulse-length dependence of the multi-photon error rate reveals a quadratic dependence in contrast to the linear dependence of resonantly excited two-level systems, improving the obtainable multi-photon error rate by several orders of magnitude for short pulses. We support our experiments with a new theoretical framework and simulation methodology to understand few-photon sources.

     
    more » « less