Subradiance in Multiply Excited States of Dipole-Coupled V-Type Atoms

Abstract

We generalize the theoretical modeling of collective atomic super- and subradiance to the multilevel case including spontaneous emission from several excited states towards a common ground state. We show that in a closely packed ensemble of $N$ atoms with $N-1$ distinct excited states each, one can find a new class of non-radiating dark states,, which allows for long-term storage of $N-1$ photonic excitations. Via dipole-dipole coupling only a single atom in the ground state is sufficient in order to suppress the decay of all $N-1$ other atoms. By means of some generic geometric configurations, like a triangle of V-type atoms or a chain of atoms with a $J=0 \to J=1$ transition, we study such subradiance including dipole-dipole interactions and show that even at finite distances long lifetimes can be observed. While generally hard to prepare deterministically, we identify various possibilities for a probabilistic preparation via a phase controlled laser pump and decay.