Paper detail

Quantum correlations by four-wave-mixing in atomic vapor. Theory and Experiments

We study both theoretically and experimentally the generation of quantum correlations in the continuous variable regime by way of four-wave mixing in a hot atomic vapor. Two theoretical approaches have been developed. On one side, we study the four-wave mixing under the "classical" non-linear optics point of view. In such a way we obtain the evolution equation for an ideal linear amplifier in a χ^(3) medium. On the other side, we present a microscopic model with 4 levels in the double-Λ configuration to calculate the χ^(3) coefficient in a atomic vapor dressed with a laser. This calculation allows us to derive the spectra of intensity noise for interesting parameters. The experimental part of this work describes the demonstration of this effect on the D1 line of rubidium 85. We present a measurement of relative intensity squeezing as high as -9.2dB below the standard quantum limit, and an original regime where quantum correlations have been measured without amplification.These results have broad applications in the field of multimode quantum optics, e.g. quantum imaging or the multimode quantum memories.