Coherence-Enhanced Optical Determination of theTh229Isomeric Transition

Abstract

The impact of coherent light propagation on the excitation and fluorescence of thorium nuclei in a crystal lattice environment is investigated theoretically. We find that in the forward direction, the fluorescence signal exhibits characteristic intensity modulations dominated by a sped-up initial decay signal that is orders of magnitude faster. This feature can be exploited for the optical determination of the isomeric transition energy. In order to obtain a unmistakable signature of the isomeric nuclear fluorescence, we put forward a novel scheme for the direct measurement of the transition energy via electromagnetically modified nuclear forward scattering involving two fields that couple to three nuclear states.

X-ray comb generation from nuclear-resonance-stabilized x-ray free-electron laser oscillator for fundamental physics and precision metrology

“…The resonant scattering or absorption amplitude is then found by multiplying Eq. (11) with (18). This leads to the absolute square of Eq.…”

“…This technique of using multiple comb lines can also be used to speed up the response of the feedback loop with very long-lived isotopes, such as 45 Sc (300 ms lifetime) whose response is intrinsically slower than the above value of 1=f FB ≈ 30 μs. In such cases, one may exploit the effect of superradiant line broadening for a faster response [18] and use several samples of different optical thickness, i.e., different amounts of line broadening, on different comb lines.…”

Nuclear clocks based on resonant excitation of γ-transitions

“…An alternative and efficient method for detection of the isomeric transition of thorium nuclei in a crystal has been proposed that is based on coherent forward scattering [46]. Because the signal would be carried in a directional beam, a detector could be placed further away from the crystal, efficiently reducing the problem of luminescence background.…”

Proposed Entanglement of X-ray Nuclear Polaritons as a Potential Method for Probing Matter at the Subatomic Scale

“…The dynamical energy exchange (multiple scattering) [35] between the states N =1 |g |e e i k· r ⊗ |0 and |G ⊗ |1 k [33] is known as dynamical beat and exhibits remarkable properties, e.g., veck directionality, speed-up and coherent emission of single x-ray quanta [32]. The collective nature of the excitation allows controlling the decay of the whole nuclear ensemble by external fields [15,[36][37][38].In Fig. 1 we put forward a method of actively distributing the single photon wave packet in two opposite directions using a normal incidence x-ray mirror.…”

“…The commissioning of the first x-ray free electron lasers (XFEL) [1][2][3][4][5] and the developments of x-ray optics elements [6][7][8][9][10][11][12] bring into play higher photon frequencies and promote the emerging field of x-ray quantum optics [13]. Apart from a powerful imaging tool, coherent x-ray light may also offer a solution for avoiding the diffraction limit bottleneck for compact photonic devices [14,15], and render possible the coherent control of transitions in ions [16][17][18][19][20] and nuclei [21][22][23][24][25][26][27]. Furthermore, new x-ray optical elements such as beam splitters [12] and mirrors [9,10] lay the foundation for developing quantum interferometers and controlling the quantum behavior of single x-ray photons.…”