Estimation of temporal separation of slow light pulses in atomic vapors by weak measurement

摘要

We show how two circular polarization components of a linearly polarizedpulse, propagating through a coherently driven dilute atomic vapor, can be wellresolved in time domain by weak measurement. Slower group velocity of one ofthe components due to electromagnetically induced transparency leads to adifferential group delay between the two components. For low number density,this delay may not be large enough to temporally resolve the two components. Weshow how this can be enhanced in terms of mean time of arrival of the outputpulse through a post-selected polarizer. We demonstrate the idea with all theanalytical and numerical results, with a specific example of alkali atoms.