Observation of interference effects via four photon excitation of highly excited Rydberg states in thermal cesium vapor (Data files)

We report on the observation of Electromagnetically Induced Transparency (EIT) and Absorption (EIA) of highly-excited Rydberg states in thermal Cs vapor using a 4-step excitation scheme. The advantage of this 4-step scheme is that the final transition to the Rydberg state has a large dipole moment and one can achieve similar Rabi frequencies to 2 or 3 step excitation schemes using two orders of magnitude less laser power. Consequently each step is driven by a relatively low power infra-red diode laser opening up the prospect for new applications. The observed lineshapes are in good agreement with simulations based on multilevel optical Bloch equations.