Abstract

For many years the coupling between internal degrees of freedom and center-of-mass motion was neglected in studies of the atom-field interaction. Recently, this subject has become prominent for its role in laser cooling and atomic interferometry, where the momentum transfer that accompanies the absorption and emission of photons provides a means for manipulating atomic velocities and center-of-mass wave functions.^1,2 In this paper, we point out the importance of momentum transfer in cavity QED and illustrate its effects in a model system.

© 1992 Optical Society of America