Slow Diffusion of Light in a Cold Atomic Cloud

We study the diffusive propagation of multiply scattered light in an optically thick cloud of cold rubidium atoms illuminated by a quasiresonant laser beam. In the vicinity of a sharp atomic resonance, the energy transport velocity of the scattered light is almost 5 orders of magnitude smaller than the vacuum speed of light, reducing strongly the diffusion constant. We verify the theoretical prediction of a frequency-independent transport time around the resonance. We also observe the effect of the residual velocity of the atoms at long times.

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Source ISSN: 0031-9007
Author Labeyrie, Guillaume, Vaujour, E., Mueller, Cord A., Delande, Dominique, Miniatura, Christian, Wilkowski, David, Kaiser, Robin
Maintainer CCSD
Last Updated May 26, 2026, 07:21 (UTC)
Created May 26, 2026, 07:21 (UTC)
Identifier hal-00023807
Language en
contributor Laboratoire Ondes et Désordre (LOD) ; Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS)
creator Labeyrie, Guillaume
date 2003-05-26T00:00:00
harvest_object_id 6bee37ee-02bc-40cf-af6c-62ae91e42ae2
harvest_source_id 3374d638-d20b-4672-ba96-a23232d55657
harvest_source_title test moissonnage SELUNE
metadata_modified 2025-03-12T00:00:00
relation info:eu-repo/semantics/altIdentifier/doi/10.1103/PhysRevLett.91.223904
set_spec type:ART