Abstract

Squeezed states of light represent a manifestation of the nonclassical character of the electromagnetic field and hence are of great intrinsic interest in quantum optics. There are as well a number of applications in measurement science and optical communication associated with the possibility of sensitivity beyond the standard quan­tum limit. The experiments that we have undertaken attempt to explore the degree of achievable and detectable squeezing in three distinct physical systems. From a conceptual point of view each is in some sense ideal and should provide a large degree of squeezing. However, in practice each offers a potential set of advantages and disadvantages associated with technological constraints and with a lack of precise correspondence between experiment and existing theoretical models. The three experiments that we describe are as follows: (1) degenerate parametric oscillation in a doubly resonant cavity pumped by the frequency-doubled light from a Nd:YAG laser at 1.06 μm, (2) intracavity second harmonic generation in a doubly resonant cavity pumped at a fundamental wave­length of 515 nm with an Ar⁺ laser, and (3) optical bistability for a collection of two-level atoms within a high finesse interferometer of decay rate comparable to the inverse atomic lifetime.

© 1986 Optical Society of America