Nonlinear dissipation-induced photon blockade

Abstract

We propose a theoretical scheme for photon blockade in a cavity quantum electrodynamic system consisting of an $N$-type atomic medium interacting with a single-mode Fabry-P\'erot cavity. In contrast to inefficient nonlinear-dispersion-induced photon blockade suppressed by a large detuning of atomic transitions, the photon blockade in our scheme is induced by a large nonlinear dissipation of the cavity created by the near-resonant $N$-type atomic system. A deep photon blockade is manifested by a vanishing equal-time second-order correlation function within the cavity linewidth. We also provide an explanation for this dissipation-induced photon blockade. This work provides an efficient photon blockade because it works in the near-resonance case.