Skip to main content

Thank you for visiting nature.com. You are using a browser version with limited support for CSS. To obtain the best experience, we recommend you use a more up to date browser (or turn off compatibility mode in Internet Explorer). In the meantime, to ensure continued support, we are displaying the site without styles and JavaScript.

  • News & Views
  • Published:

Quantum optics

Strongly interacting photons

A fine marriage between atomic and optical physics has produced a medium that is transparent to single photons but opaque to multiple photons. The finding heralds the development of devices such as single-photon switches. See Letter p.57

This is a preview of subscription content, access via your institution

Access options

Buy this article

Prices may be subject to local taxes which are calculated during checkout

Figure 1: A stream of single photons.

Notes

  1. *This article and the paper under discussion2 were published online on 25 July 2012.

References

  1. Birnbaum, K. M. et al. Nature 436, 87–90 (2005).

    Article  ADS  CAS  Google Scholar 

  2. Peyronel, T. et al. Nature 488, 57–60 (2012).

    Article  ADS  CAS  Google Scholar 

  3. Fleischhauer, M., Imamoglu, A. & Marangos, J. P. Rev. Mod. Phys. 77, 633–673 (2005).

    Article  ADS  CAS  Google Scholar 

  4. Harris, S. E. & Yamamoto, Y. Phys. Rev. Lett. 81, 3611–3614 (1998).

    Article  ADS  CAS  Google Scholar 

  5. Saffman, M., Walker, T. G. & Molmer, K. Rev. Mod. Phys. 82, 2313–2363 (2010).

    Article  ADS  CAS  Google Scholar 

  6. Pritchard, J. D., Weatherill, K. J. & Adams, C. S. Preprint at http://arxiv.org/abs/1205.4890 (2012).

  7. Wilk, T. et al. Phys. Rev. Lett. 104, 010502 (2010).

    Article  ADS  CAS  Google Scholar 

  8. Isenhower, L. et al. Phys. Rev. Lett. 104, 010503 (2010).

    Article  ADS  CAS  Google Scholar 

  9. Dudin, Y. O. & Kuzmich, A. Science 336, 887–889 (2012).

    Article  ADS  CAS  Google Scholar 

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

Authors

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Thad G. Walker.

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Cite this article

Walker, T. Strongly interacting photons. Nature 488, 39–40 (2012). https://doi.org/10.1038/nature11384

Download citation

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/nature11384

Search

Quick links

Nature Briefing

Sign up for the Nature Briefing newsletter — what matters in science, free to your inbox daily.

Get the most important science stories of the day, free in your inbox. Sign up for Nature Briefing