Physics 404 and 690-03
Spring 2011

Atomic Physics and Quantum Optics 

Course Materials:

• Week 0: 1/19-21                Intro to Atomic Physics
  Physics 404 and Physics 690-03 syllabus
  Monday (1/18) overheads -- Introductory lecture
  
  
  
• Week 1: 1/24-28                Semi-Classical Model of Atom-Light Interactions
  Problem Set #1 due Friday, Feb. 4
  Wednesday (1/26) overheads -- First order coherence
  
  
  
• Week 2: 1/31-2/4                    Classical Coherence Theory of Light
  Wednesday (2/2) overheads -- 2nd Order Coherence
  
  
  
• Week 3: 2/7-11                    2-Level Atoms
  Problem Set #2 due Friday, Feb. 18
  Monday (2/7) overheads -- 2nd order coherence applications
  Friday (2/11) overheads -- Animation of 5-level Rabi-flopping
  
  
  
• Week 4: 2/14-18                    Dressed Atom Theory
  Wednesday (2/16) overheads -- Mollow triplets and optical dipole laser traps
  
  
  
• Week 5: 2/21-25                     Spontaneous Emission
  Problem Set #3 due Friday, Mar. 4
  Monday (2/21) overheads -- Atomic clocks
  
  
  
• Week 6: 2/28-3/4                     Density Matrix, Resonance Fluorescence, Quantum Trajectories
  Problem Set #4 due Friday, March 18
  Classical Monte Carlo worksheet
  Friday (3/4) overheads -- Quantum Monte Carlo (quantum trajectories)
  
  
  
• Week 7: 3/14-18                     Multi-Level Atoms and Selection Rules
  Monday (3/14) overheads -- Review of Atomic Structure
  Wednesday (3/16) overheads -- Hyperfine Structure and Zeeman Shifts
  Friday (3/18) overheads -- Midterm review
  
  
  
• Week 8: 3/21-25                     Laser Cooling and Trapping I
  Midterm on Monday, March 21.
  Wednesday (3/23) overheads -- E1 transition selection rules
  Friday (3/25) overheads -- Doppler cooling
  Problem Set #5 due Monday, Apr. 4
  
  
  
• Week 9: 3/28-4/1                     Laser Cooling and Trapping II
  Wednesday (3/30) overheads -- Sisyphus cooling
  
  
  
• Week 10: 4/4-8                     3-Level Atoms
  Monday (4/4) overheads -- Evaporative cooling
  
  
  
• Week 11: 4/11-4/15                     Photons I: Quantized light, Fock States, and Coherent States
  Problem set due Wednesday, April 20, 2011
  
  
  
• Week 12: 4/18-4/22              Photons II: 2-level Atom in a Quantized EM-field ... and the Casimir Force
  Problem set due Friday, April 29, 2011
  
  
  
• Week 13: 4/25-4/29                     Second Quantization and Bose-Einstein Condensation
  Student presentation: Monday, April 25, 2011.
  Paper due date: Friday, April 29, 2011.
  Friday, April 29 overheads -- Bose-Einstein Condensation