Coherent intermittency in the resonant fluorescence of a multilevel atom

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Abstract
Time correlations in the fluorescence of a multilevel atom are studied in terms of the quantum statistics which describe the emission of the next photon. The next photon equations are substantially simpler than the a photon equations (or so-called optical Bloch equations) yet they contain phase information lost in the averaging procedure that yields the a photon equations. Employing the next photon equations we present a quantum formalism in which the time development of the wave function of the atom is dramatically modified by the observation of a dark period. This ‘‘collapse’’ of the quantum state due to measurements with a null result (such as the failure to record events in a photodetector) is the cause of intermittent atomic fluorescence even when the exciting field is arbitrarily coherent. The next photon and a photon formalisms are contrasted and applied to photon antibunching. The phenomenon of photon bunching which characterizes sideband correlations is also calculated. Observable effects particular to the coherent intermittency are emphasized.