Mechanisms for lasing with cold atoms as the gain medium

Phys Rev Lett. 2008 Aug 29;101(9):093002. doi: 10.1103/PhysRevLett.101.093002. Epub 2008 Aug 29.

Abstract

We realize a laser with a cloud of cold rubidium atoms as gain medium, placed in a low-finesse cavity. Three different regimes of laser emission are observed corresponding, respectively, to Mollow, Raman, and four-wave mixing mechanisms. We measure an output power of up to 300 microW and present the main properties of these different lasers in each regime.