Starting from a three-level atom coupled to two modes of a radiation field, we derive a Raman-coupled Hamiltonian. The exact results are employed to carry out a careful investigation of the temporal evolution of the entropy. A factorization of the initial density operator is assumed, with the privileged field modes being in a coherent state. We invoke the mathematical concept of the maximum variation of a function to construct a measure for entropy fluctuations. It is shown that when the individual modes of the field are far detuned from the intermediate atomic level, there is a dynamical Stark shift induced by the Kerr-like medium. The results show that the Kerr effect creates the superstructure of atomic Rabi oscillation and changes the quasiperiod of the field entropy evolution and entanglement between the atom and the field. The dynamic behavior of the mean atomic level occupation probabilities are investigated numerically as functions of time. A number of novel phenomena are discovered and discussed. §1. Overview Quantum computers promise to greatly increase the efficiency of solving problems such as factoring large integers and combinatorial optimization. 1) One of the greatest challenges now is to implement the basic quantum-computational elements in a physical system and demonstrate that they can be reliably controlled. One of the earliest proposals 2) for implementing quantum computation is based on encoding each qubit in two optical modes together containing exactly one photon. The main problem with this proposal is that it is extremely difficult to nonlinearly couple two optical modes containing few photons. Ion trap quantum computation, first proposed by Cirac and Zoller, 3) is a potentially powerful technique for the storage and manipulation of quantum information. In this scheme, information is stored in the spin states of an array of trapped ions and manipulated using laser pulses. Reasonably long coherence times can be realized, and individual qubits can be addressed by virtue of the spatial separation of the ions. Experimental implementations of this scheme have succeeded in the performance of simple two-qubit logic gates and preparing entangled states. 4), 5)In recent years, much attention has been focused on the properties of the entanglement between the field and the atom 6) -9) and in particular on the entropy of the system, employing the entropy theory regarding the interaction of the field with the * )