Amplification and storage of light carrying orbital angular momentum via magnetically assisted gain in cold atoms

Abstract

Abstract We report on the amplification and the storage of a light vortex beam carrying orbital angular momentum (OAM) in an ensemble of cold cesium atoms in the presence of an external transverse magnetic field. This magnetically assisted optical gain was previously reported in a recent publication and originates from the manipulation of the induced dark state by the external magnetic field. Single pass optical gain exceeding 100 % was measured for beams with different topological charges. Furthermore, we also demonstrate the storage and retrieval of the vortex beams, showing that the amplification and the storage processes preserve the coherent nature of the optical vortex. A simple theoretical model based on density matrix numeric calculation and which accounts for the presence of the external magnetic field was developed and present qualitative agreement with the observed results. Owing to the recent proposal of using light carrying OAM for efficient data transmission systems, we believe our results could find application in communications protocols involving distant nodes.