Observations of qualitatively different coherent transient phenomena associated with bichromatic optical excitation are reported. The effects demonstrated include the control of atomic dynamics through a variation of the initial relative phase of the driving fields and the polarization of population within atom-field dressed states. The dynamics observed are fundamentally more complex than those characteristic of monochromatically driven atoms.

• Received 2 December 1993

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevA.49.R1519