Critical slowing down in an optical bistable model with Kerr-nonlinear blackbody reservoir

Sharaby, YA, Hassan, SS and Lynch, S (2016) Critical slowing down in an optical bistable model with Kerr-nonlinear blackbody reservoir. Optik - International Journal for Light and Electron Optics, 127 (21). pp. 10195-10200. ISSN 0030-4026

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Abstract

We investigate switching response for an Optical Bistable (OB) device consisting of homogeneously broadened two-level atoms in a ring cavity supported by a Kerr Nonlinear Blackbody (KNB) radiation reservoir in the high-Q cavity regime for both absorptive and dispersive cases. In the resonant case and below a transition temperature, faster switching processes for OB devices with KNB can be triggered by a small perturbation of the incident field in the vicinity of the critical transition point. The switching time increases with increasing atomic detuning parameter. A thermal switching process is obtained for a fixed incident field and is triggered by small perturbation in the relative reservoir temperature, say. The switching time is reduced considerably by slightly increasing the temperature . Comparison with other cases of radiation reservoir is made, namely, normal, thermal and squeezed vacuum.