Solid State Coherent Transient Measurements Using Hard Optical Pulses

An isolated and spectrally narrow absorptive feature is prepared via a novel spectral hole burning process in an inhomogeneously broadened optical transition in ${\mathrm{Eu}}^{3+}:{\mathrm{Y}}_2{\mathrm{SiO}}_5$. With the narrow feature it is shown that it is feasible to apply complex optical pulse sequences analogous to rf pulse sequences used extensively in NMR.