Vacuum-induced suppression and enhancement of four-wave mixing in an optical cavity

摘要

We report on an experimental study of vacuum-induced suppression and enhancement of four-wave mixing (FWM) signal in a composite atom-cavity system. By scanning the additional dressing field, the suppression ratio of the FWM signal can reach 90 % compared with 40 % without cavity. We attribute the enhanced suppression and enhancement to the atom-cavity coupling arising from a vacuum-induced Raman process, which amplifies the dressing effect from the additional field. Also, the dressing asymmetry of the atom-cavity coupling is discussed and used to estimate the nonlinearity of atomic medium in the cavity. The suppression and enhancement can be interpreted by a dressed-state picture and agree with theoretical calculations. The investigation may find applications in optical switch and quantum memory controlled by cavity.