Abstract

Optical bistability is reexamined as a candidate system for the generation of squeezed states of light. Previous analyses have concluded that significant squeezing can be achieved only in a rather extreme range of parameter space relative to current experimental capabilities and only over a restricted range of frequencies near the carrier.¹ By contrast we have identified a new regime in which appreciable squeezing should be obtainable for rather modest operating conditions and without excessive demands on the stability of external control parameters. Following the treatment by Carmichael,² we have conducted a theoretical search for optimal squeezing in optical bistability in the general case without adiabatic elimination of atomic or cavity variables. Our analysis is based on a linearization of the generalized Fokker-Planck equation for a system of N atoms coupled to a single mode of a high finesse cavity. For comparable atomic and cavity decay rates, there is a mode splitting in the eigenvalue structure of the system which is responsible for the vacuum field Rabi splitting. It is near the spectral features associated with these vacuum field Rabi sidebands that we find significant squeezing. The concepts of optimum squeezing as indicated by Mandel's Q parameter and by the spectrum of squeezing are discussed with reference to the various operating regimes in optical bistability.

© 1986 Optical Society of America