Photon-antibunching in the fluorescence of statistical ensembles of emitters at an optical nanofiber-tip

Abstract

This proposal investigates the photon-statistics of light emitted by a statistical ensemble of cold atoms excited by the near-field of an optical nanofiber tip. Dipole–dipole interactions of atoms at such short distance from each other suppress the simultaneous emission of more than one photon and lead to antibunching of photons. We consider a mean atom number on the order of one and deal with a Poissonian mixture of one and two atoms including dipole–dipole interactions and collective decay. Time tracks of the atomic states are simulated in quantum Monte Carlo simulations from which the g ^(2) -photon autocorrelation function is derived. The general results can be applied to any statistical ensemble of emitters that are interacting by dipole–dipole interactions.

Keywords

• single photon source
• plasmonics
• nanotip
• fluorescence enhancement
• Purcell effect
• cold atoms