Bonn 2025 – scientific programme

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QI: Fachverband Quanteninformation

QI 43: Open Quantum Systems II (joint session Q/QI)

QI 43.4: Talk

Friday, March 14, 2025, 11:45–12:00, HS I

Microscopic model for a nonliner dissipative dielectric medium — •Nils Berhausen, Sascha Lang, and Stefan Yoshi Buhmann — Institut für Physik, Universität Kassel, Heinrich-Plett-Straße 40, 34132 Kassel, Germany

Through nonlinear optical effects, such as the Kerr effect, it is experimentally possible to artificially generate spacetimedependent refractive index modulations via strong electric fields. Suitable experimental setups allow for generating backgrounds which affect the field dynamics similarly to nontrivial curved spacetimes. For instance, tabletop setups with refractive index modulations can give rise to photon pair creation that can be observed by the technique of electro-optic sampling in certain nonlinear crystals. In existing theoretical works, the dynamics of nonlinear optical media is usually described in a phenomenologically motivated extension of linear macroscopic electrodynamics, which does not necessarily cover the full quantum vacuum dynamics. In this talk, I will present first results on an alternative microscopic approach for nonlinear optical media. To incorporate nonlinearities, we describe the medium with anharmonic oscillators and allow those oscillators to nonlinearly couple to the electric field. The resulting model takes into account a number of nonlinear optical effects, including second-harmonic generation.

Keywords: Nonlinear optics; Microscopic models; Hopfield dielectric