We have theoretically analyzed nonclassical paired photons generated spontaneously from a four-level inverted-Y atomic system. We discuss the feasibility of biphoton generation due to different pumping arrangements. Two types of correlated photon pair emissions have been carefully examined: dressed cascade and dressed double-$\Lambda$ emissions. In the dressed cascade two-photon emission, the coincidence counting rate may exhibit a damped Rabi oscillation, in contrast with a simple exponential decay feature in the literatures. In the dressed double-$\Lambda$ configuration, we show that not only is the temporal correlation of entangled Stokes–anti-Stokes photons in agreement with discussions presented by Wen et al. [Phys. Rev. A 76, 013825 (2007)], but also the oscillation period may be manipulated by altering either the control Rabi frequency or the dressing Rabi frequency or both. All the observed damped Rabi oscillations in the two-photon coincidences result from the destructive interference among the possible four-wave mixing processes occurring in the atom-field interaction system. This feature of the two-photon amplitude is governed by the convolution between the phase matching and third-order nonlinear susceptibility. The methodology adopted here can be applied to other atomic-level configurations and provides a useful tool to study the spectroscopy of the system. The generated narrow-band photon pairs may have potential applications in long-distance quantum communication and quantum information processing.

• Received 19 November 2007

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevA.77.033816