Abstract

Over the past few years optical two-level systems have been studied as model systems for quantum physics (see Ref. ¹ for a review). Phenomena such as Rabi oscillations, Autler-Townes doublet splitting, Bloch-Siegert shifts, and multiphoton resonances have been demonstrated in previous optical experiments.^1,2 The phenomena observed were nearly adiabatic effects, i.e., the populations of the adiabatic eigenstates hardly changed upon passing an avoided level crossing. Only recently was it understood that the correspondence between a two-level quantum system and a two-level optical system remains valid even in the diabatic limit.³ We present the experimental confirmation of this statement.

© 1994 IEEE