Oscillator model for vacuum Rabi splitting in microcavities

The vacuum-field Rabi splitting of an optical mode in a cavity interacting with a system of N excitations (atomic or electronic) represented by harmonic oscillators is obtained quantum mechanically both without and with coupling to dissipation. The optical lineshapes and the scaling of the Rabi splitting with the number of oscillators and its dependence on the damping parameters are given. Corresponding results are given for a classical treatment of the oscillators, and it is shown that to the leading order in the dissipation, the quantum mechanical results for absorption are the same as the classical ones. [S0163-1829(99)09515-6].