Coherent transients mimicked by two-photon coherent control of a three-level system

Abstract

We show theoretically and experimentally that two-photon coherent control in a $V$-shape three-level system projects a one-photon coherent transient in a simple two-level system. The second- and third-order spectral phase terms of a shaped laser pulse play the roles of time and quadratic spectral phase, respectively, in conventional coherent transients. In a three-pulse coherent control experiment of atomic rubidium, the phase and amplitude of controlled transition probability is retrieved from a two-dimensional Fourier-transform spectral peak. It is hoped that this control scheme may harness coherent control capability on multidimensional Fourier-transform spectroscopy.