Strong coupling and high-contrast all-optical modulation in atomic cladding waveguides

In recent years, there has been marked increase in research aimed to introduce alkali vapours into guided-wave configurations. Owing to the significant reduction in device dimensions, the increase in density of states, the interaction with surfaces and primarily the high intensities carried along the structure, a plethora of light–vapour interactions can be studied. Moreover, such platform may exhibit new functionalities such as low-power nonlinear light–matter interactions. One immense challenge is to study the effects of quantum coherence and shifts in nanoscale waveguides, characterized by ultra-small mode areas and fast dynamics. Here, we construct a highly compact 17 mm long serpentine silicon-nitride atomic vapour cladding waveguide. Fascinating and important phenomena such as van-der-Waals shifts, dynamical stark shifts and coherent effects such as strong coupling (in the form of Autler–Townes splitting) are observed. Some of these effects may play an important role in applications such as all-optical switching, frequency referencing and magnetometry.