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Lubricated tribological contact processes are important in both nature and in many technical applications. Fluid lubricants play an important role in contact processes, e.g. they reduce friction and cool the contact zone. The fundamentals of lubricated contact processes on the atomistic scale are, however, today not fully understood. A lubricated contact process is defined here as a process, where two solid bodies that are in close proximity and eventually in parts in direct contact, carry out a relative motion, whereat the remaining volume is submersed by a fluid lubricant. Such lubricated contact processes are difficult to examine experimentally. Atomistic simulations are an attractive alternative for investigating the fundamentals of such processes. In this work, molecular dynamics simulations were used for studying different elementary processes of lubricated tribological contacts. A simplified, yet realistic simulation setup was developed in this work for that purpose using classical force fields. In particular, the two solid bodies were fully submersed in the fluid lubricant such that the squeeze-out was realistically modeled. The velocity of the relative motion of the two solid bodies was imposed as a boundary condition. Two types of cases were considered in this work: i) a model system based on synthetic model substances, which enables a direct, but generic, investigation of molecular interaction features on the contact process; and ii) real substance systems, where the force fields describe specific real substances. Using the model system i), also the reproducibility of the findings obtained from the computer experiments was critically assessed. In most cases, also the dry reference case was studied. Both mechanical and thermodynamic properties were studied -- focusing on the influence of lubrication. The following properties were studied: The contact forces, the coefficient of friction, the dislocation behavior in the solid, the chip formation and the formation of the groove, the squeeze-out behavior of the fluid in the contact zone, the local temperature and the energy balance of the system, the adsorption of fluid particles on the solid surfaces, as well as the formation of a tribofilm. Systematic studies were carried out for elucidating the influence of the wetting behavior, the influence of the molecular architecture of the lubricant, and the influence of the lubrication gap height on the contact process. As expected, the presence of a fluid lubricant reduces the temperature in the vicinity of the contact zone. The presence of the lubricant is, moreover, found to have a significant influence on the friction and on the energy balance of the process. The presence of a lubricant reduces the coefficient of friction compared to a dry case in the starting phase of a contact process, while lubricant molecules remain in the contact zone between the two solid bodies. This is a result of an increased normal and slightly decreased tangential force in the starting phase. When the fluid molecules are squeezed out with ongoing contact time and the contact zone is essentially dry, the coefficient of friction is increased by the presence of a fluid compared to a dry case. This is attributed to an imprinting of individual fluid particles into the solid surface, which is energetically unfavorable. By studying the contact process in a wide range of gap height, the entire range of the Stribeck curve is obtained from the molecular simulations. Thereby, the three main lubrication regimes of the Stribeck curve and their transition regions are covered, namely boundary lubrication (significant elastic and plastic deformation of the substrate), mixed lubrication (adsorbed fluid layers dominate the process), and hydrodynamic lubrication (shear flow is set up between the surface and the asperity). The atomistic effects in the different lubrication regimes are elucidated. Notably, the formation of a tribofilm is observed, in which lubricant molecules are immersed into the metal surface. The formation of a tribofilm is found to have important consequences for the contact process. The work done by the relative motion is found to mainly dissipate and thereby heat up the system. Only a minor part of the work causes plastic deformation. Finally, the assumptions, simplifications, and approximations applied in the simulations are critically discussed, which highlights possible future work.
Functional structures as well as materials provided by nature have always been a great source of inspiration for new technologies. Adapting and improving the discovered concepts, however, demands a detailed understanding of their working principles, while employing natural materials for fabrication tasks requires suitable functionalization and modification.
In this thesis, the white scales of the beetle Cyphochilus are examined in order to reveal unknown aspects of their light transport properties. In addition, the monomer of the material they are made of is utilized for 3D microfabrication.
White beetle scales have been fascinating scientists for more than a decade because they display brilliant whiteness despite their small thickness and the low refractive index contrast. Their optical properties arise from highly efficient light scattering within the disordered intra-scale network structure.
To gain a better understanding of the scattering properties, several previous studies have investigated the light transport and its connection to the structural anisotropy with the aid of diffusion theory. While this framework allows to relate the light scattering to macroscopic transport properties, an accurate determination of the effective refractive index of the structure is required. Due to its simplicity, the Maxwell-Garnett mixing rule is frequently used for this task, although its constraint to particle and feature sizes much smaller than the wavelength is clearly violated for the scales.
To provide a correct calculation of the effective refractive index, here, finite-difference time-domain simulations are used to systematically examine the impact of size effects on the effective refractive index. Deploying this simulation approach, the Maxwell-Garnett mixing rule is shown to break down for large particles. In contrast, it is found that a quadratic polynomial function describes the effective refractive index in close approximation, while its coefficients can be obtained from an empirical linear function. As a result, a simple mixing rule is reported that unambiguously surpasses classical mixing rules when composite media containing large feature sizes are considered. This is important not only for the accurate description of white beetle scales, but also for other turbid media, such as biological tissues in opto-biomedical diagnostics.
Describing light transport by means of diffusion theory moreover neglects any coherent effects, such as interference. Hence, their impact on the generation of brilliant whiteness is currently unknown. To shed a light on their role, spatial- and time-resolved light scattering spectromicroscopy is applied to investigate the scales and a model structure of them based on disordered Bragg stacks. For both structures the occurrence of weakly localized photonic modes, i.e., closed scattering loops, is observed, which is further verified in accompanying simulations. As shown in this thesis, leakage from these random photonic modes contributes at least 20% to the overall reflected light. This reveals the importance of coherent effects for a complete description of the underlying light transport properties; an aspect that is entirely missing in the purely diffusive transport presumed so far. Identifying the importance of weak localization for the generation of brilliant whiteness paves the way to further enhance the design of efficient optical scattering media, an issue that recently drawn great attention.
Unlike their plant-based counterparts, rigid carbohydrates, such as chitin, are currently unavailable for 3D microfabrication via direct laser writing, despite their great significance in the animal kingdom for the construction of functional microstructures. To overcome this gap, the monomeric unit of chitin, N-acetyl-D-glucosamine, is here functionalized to serve as a photo-crosslinkable monomer in a non-hydrogel photoresist. Since all previous photoresists based on animal carbohydrates are in the form of hydrogel formulations, a new group of photoresists is established for direct laser writing.
Moreover, it is exhibited that the sensitization effect, previously used only in the context of UV curing, can be successfully transferred to direct laser writing to increase the maximum writing speed. This effect is based on the beneficial combination of two photoinitiators.
In this, one photoinitiator is an efficient crosslinking agent for the monomer used, but a rather poor two-photon absorber. The other photoinitiator (called sensitizer) possesses, conversely, a much higher two-photon absorption coefficient at the applied wavelength but is not well suited as a crosslinking agent. In combination, the energy absorbed by the sensitizer is passed to the photoinitiator, resulting in the formation of radicals needed to start the polymerization. As this greatly increases the rate at which the photoinitiator is radicalized, resists containing a photoinitiator and a sensitizer are shown to outperform resists containing only one of the components. Deploying the sensitization effect in direct laser writing therefore offers a simple way to individually tune the crosslinking ability and the two-photon absorption properties by combining existing compounds, compared to the costly chemical synthesis of novel, customized photoinitiators.
There are a lot of photonic micro- and nano-structures in nature that consist of materials with a low refractive index and that can keep up with artificial structures concerning optical properties like scattering or coloration. This work aims to understand the photonic structures in the silver ant Cataglyphis bombycina, the blue butterfly of genus Morpho, the beetle Entimus imperialis, which shows polarization-dependent reflection, and the white beetle Cyphochilus insulanus. Furthermore, corresponding micro- and nano-structures are fabricated.
Bioinspired models with the same optical properties as the investigated structures are developed and analyzed using geometric optics and finite-difference time-domain calculations. These models are qualitatively and quantitatively compared regarding their optical properties with the original structures and fabricated by direct laser writing. To mimic potential effects of material-based disorder of the natural photonic structures, a cellulose-based resist for direct laser writing is developed and examined.
Conventional resists in direct laser writing can be replaced by a resist containing cellulose derivatives. Here, different combinations of cellulose derivatives, initiators, and solvents are examined. The best performance is observed for a combination of methacrylated cellulose acetate (MACA500), 2-Isopropyl-9H-thioxanthen-9-one (ITX), and dimethyl sulfoxide (DMSO). These resists allow for direction is attained. The achieved cross-linking enables stable three-dimensional structures and, together with the possible resolution, allows to fabricate the model inspired by the white beetle Cyphochilus insulanus in the cellulose-based resist.
The silver appearance of the Cataglyphis bombycina can be completely explained with geometric optics in the prism-shaped hairs that cover its body. The more complex structures of the other three insects use photonic crystal-like material arrangements with a varying amount of disorder. The polarization dependence of the Entimus imperialis arises from a diamond structure inside the scales of the beetle and can be mimicked with a photonic woodpile crystal. The blue butterfly of the genus Morpho and the white beetle Cyphochilus insulanus both can be reduced to disordered Bragg stacks, in which the exact properties are achieved by introducing different amounts of disorder. For Cataglyphis bombycina, Entimus imperialis, and Cyphochilus insulanus, the developed bioinspired models are fabricated using conventional resists in direct laser writing. All models show a qualitative correspondence to the optical properties of the original structures.
The cellulose-based resists enable the use of polysaccharides in direct laser writing and the concepts can be transferred to other polysaccharides, like chitin. The analysis of the different natural photonic structures and the developed bioinspired models reveal a material independence of the structures that allows the fabrication of these models in different transparent materials.
Topological insulators (TI) are a fascinating new state of matter. Like usual insulators, their band structure possesses a band gap, such that they cannot conduct current in their bulk. However, they are able to conduct current along their edges and surfaces, due to edge states that cross the band gap. What makes TIs so interesting and potentially useful are these robust unidirectional edge currents. They are immune to significant defects and disorder, which means that they provide scattering-free transport.
In photonics, using topological protection has a huge potential for applications, e.g. for robust optical data transfer [1-3] – even on the quantum level [4, 5] – or to make devices more stable and robust [6, 7]. Therefore, the field of topological insulators has spread to optics to create the new and active research field of topological photonics [8-10].
Well-defined and controllable model systems can help to provide deeper insight into the mechanisms of topologically protected transport. These model systems provide a vast control over parameters. For example, arbitrary lattice types without defects can be examined, and single lattice sites can be manipulated. Furthermore, they allow for the observation of effects that usually happen at extremely short time-scales in solids. Model systems based on photonic waveguides are ideal candidates for this.
They consist of optical waveguides arranged on a lattice. Due to evanescent coupling, light that is inserted into one waveguide spreads along the lattice. This coupling of light between waveguides can be seen as an analogue to electrons hopping/tunneling between atomic lattice sites in a solid.
The theoretical basis for this analogy is given by the mathematical equivalence between Schrödinger and paraxial Helmholtz equation. This means that in these waveguide systems, the role of time is assigned to a spatial axis. The field evolution along the waveguides' propagation axis z thus models the temporal evolution of an electron's wave-function in solid states. Electric and magnetic fields acting on electrons in solids need to be incorporated into the photonic platform by introducing artificial fields. These artificial gauge fields need to act on photons in the same way that their electro-magnetic counterparts act on electrons. E.g., to create a photonic analogue of a topological insulator the waveguides are bent helically along their propagation axis to model the effect of a magnetic field [3]. This means that the fabrication of these waveguide arrays needs to be done in 3D.
In this thesis, a new method to 3D micro-print waveguides is introduced. The inverse structure is fabricated via direct laser writing, and subsequently infiltrated with a material with higher refractive index contrast. We will use these model systems of evanescently coupled waveguides to look at different effects in topological systems, in particular at Floquet topological systems.
We will start with a topologically trivial system, consisting of two waveguide arrays with different artificial gauge fields. There, we observe that an interface between these trivial gauge fields has a profound impact on the wave vector of the light traveling across it. We deduce an analog to Snell's law and verify it experimentally.
Then we will move on to Floquet topological systems, consisting of helical waveguides. At the interface between two Floquet topological insulators with opposite helicity of the waveguides, we find additional trivial interface modes that trap the light. This allows to investigate the interaction between trivial and topological modes in the lattice.
Furthermore, we address the question if topological edge states are robust under the influence of time-dependent defects. In a one-dimensional topological model (the Su-Schrieffer-Heeger model [11]) we apply periodic temporal modulations to an edge wave-guide. We find Floquet copies of the edge state, that couple to the bulk in a certain frequency window and thus depopulate the edge state.
In the two-dimensional Floquet topological insulator, we introduce single defects at the edge. When these defects share the temporal periodicity of the helical bulk waveguides, they have no influence on a topological edge mode. Then, the light moves around/through the defect without being scattered into the bulk. Defects with different periodicity, however, can – likewise to the defects in the SSH model – induce scattering of the edge state into the bulk.
In the end we will briefly highlight a newly emerging method for the fabrication of waveguides with low refractive index contrast. Moreover, we will introduce new ways to create artificial gauge fields by the use of orbital angular momentum states in waveguides.
Combining ultracold atomic gases with the peculiar properties of Rydberg excited atoms gained a lot of theoretical and experimental attention in recent years. Embedded in the ultracold gas, an interaction between the Rydberg atom and the surrounding ground state atoms arises through the scattering of the Rydberg electron from an intruding perturber atom. This peculiar interaction gives rise to a plenitude of previously unobserved effects. Within the framework of the present thesis, this interaction is studied in detail for Rydberg \(P\)-states in rubidium.
Due to their long lifetime, atoms in Rydberg states are subject to scattering with the surrounding ground state atoms in the ultracold cloud. By measuring their lifetime as a function of the ground state atom flux, we are able to obtain the total inelastic scattering cross section as well as the partial cross section for associative ionisation. The fact that the latter is three orders of magnitude larger than the size of the formed molecular
ion indicates the presence of an efficient mass transport mechanism that is mediated by the Rydberg–ground state interaction. The immense acceleration of the collisional process shows a close analogy to a catalytic process. The increase of the scattering cross section renders associative ionisation an important process that has to be considered for experiments in dense ultracold systems.
The interaction of the Rydberg atom with a ground state perturber gives rise to a highly oscillatory potential that supports molecular bound states. These so-called ultralong-range Rydberg molecules are studied with high resolution time-of-flight spectroscopy, where we are able to determine the binding energies and lifetimes of the molecular states between the two fine structure split \(25P\)-states. Inside an electric field, we observe a broadening of the
molecular lines that indicates the presence of a permanent electric dipole moment, induced by the mixing with high angular momentum states. Due to the mixing of the ground state atom’s hyperfine states by the molecular interaction, we are able to observe a spin-flip of the perturber upon creation of a Rydberg molecule. Furthermore, an incidental near-degeneracy in the underlying level scheme of the \(25P\)-state gives rise to highly entangled states between the Rydberg fine structure state and the perturber’s hyperfine structure. These mechanisms can be used to manipulate the quantum state of a remote particle over distances that exceed by far the typical contact interaction range.
Apart from the ultralong-range Rydberg molecules that predominantly consist of only one low angular momentum state, a class of Rydberg molecules is predicted to exist that strongly mixes the high angular momentum states of the degenerate hydrogenic manifolds. These states, the so-called trilobite- and butterfly Rydberg molecules, show very peculiar properties that cannot be observed for conventional molecules. Here we present the first experimental observation of butterfly Rydberg molecules. In addition to an extensive spectroscopy that reveals the binding energy, we are also able to observe the rotational structure of these exotic molecules. The arising pendular states inside an electric field allow us, in comparison to the model of a dipolar rotor, to extract the precise bond
length and dipole moment of the molecule. With the information obtained in the present study, it is possible to photoassociate butterfly molecules with a selectable bond length, vibrational state, rotational state, and orientation inside an electric field.
By shedding light on various previously unrevealed aspects, the experiments presented in this thesis significantly deepen our knowledge on the Rydberg–ground state interaction and the peculiar effects arising from it. The obtained spectroscopic information on Rydberg molecules and the changed reaction dynamics for molecular ion creation will surely provide valuable data for quantum chemical simulations and provide necessary data to plan future experiments. Beyond that, our study reveals that the hyperfine interaction in Rydberg molecules and the peculiar properties of butterfly states provide very promising new ways to alter the short- and long-range interactions in ultracold many-body systems. In this sense the investigated Rydberg–ground state interaction not only lies right at
the interface between quantum chemistry, quantum many-body systems, and Rydberg physics, but also creates many new and fascinating possibilities by combining these fields.
The present dissertation contains the theoretical studies performed on the topic of a high energy deposition in matter. The work focuses on electronic excitation and relaxation processes on ultrafast timescales. Energy deposition by means of intense ultrashort (femtosecond) laser pulses or by means of swift heavy ions irradiation have a certain similarities: the final observable material modifications result from a number of processes on different timescales. First, the electronic excitation by photoabsorption or by ion impact takes place on subfemtosecond timescales. Then these excited electrons propagate and redistribute their energy interacting among themselves and exciting secondary generations of electrons. This typically takes place on femtosecond timescales. On the order of tens to hundreds femtoseconds the excited electrons are usually thermalized. The energy exchange with the lattice atoms lasts up to tens of picoseconds. The lattice temperature can reach melting point; then the material cools down and recrystalizes, forming the final modified nanostructures, which are observed experimentally. The processes on each previous step form the initial conditions for the following step. Thus, to describe the final phase transition and formation of nanostructures, one has to start from the very beginning and follow through all the steps.
The present work focuses on the early stages of the energy dissipation after its deposition, taking place in the electronic subsystems of excited materials. Different models applicable for different excitation mechanisms will be presented: in the thesis I will start from the description of high energy excitation (electron energies of \(\sim\) keV), then I shall focus on excitations to intermediate energies of electrons (\(\sim\) 100 eV), and finally coming down to a few eV electron excitations (visible light). The results will be compared with experimental observations.
For the high energy material excitation assumed to be caused by irradiation with swift heavy ions, the classical Asymptotical Trajectory Monte-Carlo (ATMC) is applied to describe the excitation of electrons by the impact of the projectile, the initial kinetics of electrons, secondary electron creation and Auger-redistribution of holes. I first simulate the early stage (first tens of fs) of kinetics of the electronic subsystem (in silica target, SiO\(_2\)) in tracks of ions decelerated in the electronic stopping regime. It will be shown that the well pronounced front of excitation in the electronic and ionic subsystems is formed due to the propagation of electrons, which cannot be described by models based on diffusion mechanisms (e.g. parabolic equations of heat diffusion). On later timescales, the thermalization time of electrons can be estimated as a time when the particle- and the energy propagation turns from the ballistic to the diffusive one. As soon as the electrons are thermalized, one can apply the Two Temperature Model. It will be demonstrated how to combine the MC output with the two temperature model. The results of this combination demonstrate that secondary ionizations play a very important role for the track formation process, leading to energy stored in the hole subsystem. This energy storage causes a significant delay of heating and prolongs the timescales of lattice modifications up to tens of picoseconds.
For intermediate energies of excitation (XUV-VUV laser pulse excitation of materials) I applied the Monte-Carlo simulation, modified where necessary and extended in order to take into account the electronic band structure and Pauli's principle for electrons within the conduction band. I apply the new method for semiconductors and for metals on examples of solid silicon and aluminum, respectively.
It will be demonstrated that for the case of semiconductors the final kinetic energy of free electrons is much less than the total energy provided by the laser pulse, due to the energy spent to overcome ionization potentials. It was found that the final total number of electrons excited by a single photon is significantly less than \(\hbar \omega / E_{gap}\). The concept of an 'effective energy gap' is introduced for collective electronic excitation, which can be applied to estimate the free electron density after high-intensity VUV laser pulse irradiation.
For metals, experimentally observed spectra of emitted photons from irradiated aluminum can be explained well with our results. At the characteristic time of a photon emission due to radiative decay of \(L-\)shell hole (\(t < 60\) fs), the distribution function of the electrons is not yet fully thermalized. This distribution consists of two main branches: low energy distribution as a distorted Fermi-distribution, and a long high energy tail. Therefore, the experimentally observed spectra demonstrate two different branches of results: the one observed with \(L-\)shell radiation emission reflects the low energy distribution, the Bremsstrahlung spectra reflects high energy (nonthermalized) tail. The comparison with experiments demonstrated a good agreement of the calculated spectra with the experimentally observed ones.
For the irradiation of semiconductor with low energy photons (visible light), a statistical model named the "extended multiple rate equation" is proposed. Based on the earlier developed multiple rate equation, the model additionally includes the interaction of electrons with the phononic subsystem of the lattice and allows for the direct determination of the conditions for crystal damage. Our model effectively describes the dynamics of the electronic subsystem, dynamical changes in the optical properties, and lattice heating, and the results are in very good agreement with experimental measurements on the transient reflectivity and the fluence damage threshold of silicon irradiated with a femtosecond laser pulse.
thesis deals with the investigation of the dynamics of optically excited (hot) electrons in thin and ultra-thin layers. The main interests concern about the time behaviour of the dissipation of energy and momentum of the excited electrons. The relevant relaxation times occur in the femtosecond time region. The two-photon photoemission is known to be an adequate tool in order to analyse such dynamical processes in real-time. This work expands the knowledge in the fields of electron relaxation in ultra-thin silver layers on different substrates, as well as in adsorbate states in a bandgap of a semiconductor. It contributes facts to the comprehension of spin transport through an interface between a metal and a semiconductor. The primary goal was to prove the predicted theory by reducing the observed crystal in at least one direction. One expects a change of the electron relaxation behaviour while altering the crystal’s shape from a 3d bulk to a 2d (ultra-thin) layer. This is due to the fact that below a determined layer thickness, the electron gas transfers to a two-dimensional one. This behaviour could be proven in this work. In an about 3nm thin silver layer on graphite, the hot electrons show a jump to longer relaxation time all over the whole accessible energy range. It is the first time that the temporal evolution of the relaxation of excited electrons could be observed during the transition from a 3d to a 2d system. In order to reduce or even eliminate the influence coming from the substrate, the system of silver on the semiconductor GaAs, which has a bandgap of 1.5eV at the Gamma-point, was investigated. The observations of the relaxation behaviour of hot electron in different ultra-thin silver layers on this semiconductor could show, that at metal-insulator-junctions, plasmons in the silver and in the interface, as well as cascading electrons from higher lying energies, have a huge influence to the dissipation of momentum and energy. This comes mainly from the band bending of the semiconductor, and from the electrons, which are excited in GaAs. The limitation of the silver layer on GaAs in one direction led to the expected generation of quantum well states (QWS) in the bandgap. Those adsorbate states have quantised energy- and momentum values, which are directly connected to the layer thickness and the standing electron wave therein. With the experiments of this work, published values could not only be completed and proved, but it could also be determined the time evolution of such a QWS. It came out that this QWS might only be filled by electrons, which are moving from the lower edge of the conduction band of the semiconductor to the silver and suffer cascading steps there. By means of the system silver on GaAs, and of the known fact that an excitation of electrons in GaAs with circularly polarised light of the energy 1.5eV does produce spin polarised electrons in the conduction band, it became possible to bring a contribution to the hot topic of spin injection. The main target of spin injection is the transfer of spin polarised electrons out of a ferromagnet into a semiconductor, in order to develop spin dependent switches and memories. It could be demonstrated here that spin polarised electrons from GaAs can move through the interface into silver, could be photoemitted from there and their spin was still being detectable. As a third investigation system, ultra-thin silver layers were deposited on the insulator MgO, which has a bandgap of 7.8eV. Also in this system, one could recognize a change in the relaxation time while reducing the dimension of the silver layer from thick to ultra-thin. Additionally, it came out an extreme large relaxation time at a layer thickness of 0.6 – 1.2nm. This time is an order of magnitude longer than at thick films, and this is a consequence of two factors: first, the reduction of the phase space due to the confined electron gas in the z-direction, and second, the slowlier thermalisation of the electron gas due to less accessible scattering partners.
Matter-wave Optics of Dark-state Polaritons: Applications to Interferometry and Quantum Information
(2006)
The present work "Materwave Optics with Dark-state Polaritons: Applications to Interferometry and Quantum Information" deals in a broad sense with the subject of dark-states and in particular with the so-called dark-state polaritons introduced by M. Fleischhauer and M. D. Lukin. The dark-state polaritons can be regarded as a combined excitation of electromagnetic fields and spin/matter-waves. Within the framework of this thesis the special optical properties of the combined excitation are studied. On one hand a new procedure to spatially manipulate and to increase the excitation density of stored photons is described and on the other hand the properties are used to construct a new type of Sagnac Hybrid interferometer. The thesis is devided into four parts. In the introduction all notions necessary to understand the work are described, e.g.: electromagnetically induced transparency (EIT), dark-state polaritons and the Sagnac effect. The second chapter considers the method developed by A. Andre and M. D. Lukin to create stationary light pulses in specially dressed EIT-media. In a first step a set of field equations is derived and simplified by introducing a new set of normal modes. The absorption of one of the normal modes leads to the phenomenon of pulse-matching for the other mode and thereby to a diffusive spreading of its field envelope. All these considerations are based on a homogeneous field setup of the EIT preparation laser. If this restriction is dismissed one finds that a drift motion is superimposed to the diffusive spreading. By choosing a special laser configuration the drift motion can be tailored such that an effective force is created that counteracts the spreading. Moreover, the force can not only be strong enough to compensate the diffusive spreading but also to exceed this dynamics and hence to compress the field envelope of the excitation. The compression can be discribed using a Fokker-Planck equation of the Ornstein-Uhlenbeck type. The investigations show that the compression leads to an excitation of higher-order modes which decay very fast. In the last section of the chapter this exciation will be discussed in more detail and conditions will be given how the excitation of higher-order modes can be avoided or even suppressed. All results given in the chapter are supported by numerical simulatons. In the third chapter the matterwave optical properties of the dark-state polaritons will be studied. They will be used to construct a light-matterwave hybrid Sagnac interferometer. First the principle setup of such an interferometer will be sketched and the relevant equations of motion of light-matter interaction in a rotating frame will be derived. These form the basis of the following considerations of the dark-state polariton dynamics with and without the influence of external trapping potentials on the matterwave part of the polariton. It will be shown that a sensitivity enhancement compared to a passive laser gyroscope can be anticipated if the gaseous medium is initially in a superfluid quantum state in a ring-trap configuration. To achieve this enhancement a simultaneous coherence and momentum transfer is furthermore necessary. In the last part of the chapter the quantum sensitivity limit of the hybrid interferometer is derived using the one-particle density matrix equations incorporating the motion of the particles. To this end the Maxwell-Bloch equations are considered perturbatively in the rotation rate of the noninertial frame of reference and the susceptibility of the considered 3-level \(\Lambda\)-type system is derived in arbitrary order of the probe-field. This is done to determine the optimum operation point. With its help the anticipated quantum sensitivity of the light-matterwave hybrid Sagnac interferometer is calculated at the shot-noise limit and the results are compared to state-of-the-art laser and matterwave Sagnac interferometers. The last chapter of the thesis originates from a joint theoretical and experimental project with the AG Bergmann. This chapter does no longer consider the dark-state polaritons of the last two chapters but deals with the more general concept of dark states and in particular with the transient velocity selective dark states as introduced by E. Arimondo et al. In the experiment we could for the first time measure these states. The chapter starts with an introduction into the concept of velocity selective dark states as they occur in a \(\Lambda\)-configuration. Then we introduce the transient velocity selective dark-states as they occur in an particular extension of the \(\Lambda\)-system. For later use in the simulations the relevant equations of motion are derived in detail. The simulations are based on the solution of the generalized optical Bloch equations. Finally the experimental setup and procedure are explained and the theoretical and experimental results are compared.
Microsystem technology has been a fast evolving field over the last few years. Its ability to handle volumes in the sub-microliter range makes it very interesting for potential application in fields such as biology, medicine and pharmaceutical research. However, the use of micro-fabricated devices for the analysis of liquid biological samples still has to prove its applicability for many particular demands of basic research. This is particularly true for samples consisting of complex protein mixtures. The presented study therefore aimed at evaluating if a commonly used glass-coating technique from the field of micro-fluidic technology can be used to fabricate an analysis system for molecular biology. It was ultimately motivated by the demand to develop a technique that allows the analysis of biological samples at the single-cell level. Gene expression at the transcription level is initiated and regulated by DNA-binding proteins. To fully understand these regulatory processes, it is necessary to monitor the interaction of specific transcription factors with other elements - proteins as well as DNA sites - in living cells. One well-established method to perform such analysis is the Chromatin Immunoprecipitation (CHIP) assay. To map protein-DNA interactions, living cells are treated with formaldehyde in vivo to cross-link DNA-binding proteins to their resident sites. The chromatin is then broken into small fragments, and specific antibodies against the protein of interest are used to immunopurify the chromatin fragments to which those factors are bound. After purification, the associated DNA can be detected and analyzed using Polymerase Chain Reaction (PCR). Current CHIP technology is limited as it needs a relatively large number of cells while there is increasing interest in monitoring DNA-protein interactions in very few, if not single cells. Most notably this is the case in research on early organism development (embryogenesis). To investigate if microsystem technology can be used to analyze DNA-protein complexes from samples containing chromatin from only few cells, a new setup for fluid transport in glass capillaries of 75 µm inner diameter has been developed, forming an array of micro-columns for parallel affinity chromatography. The inner capillary walls were antibody-coated using a silane-based protocol. The remaining surface was made chemically inert by saturating free binding sites with suitable biomolecules. Variations of this protocol have been tested. Furthermore, the sensitivity of the PCR method to detect immunoprecipitated protein-DNA complexes was improved, resulting in the reliable detection of about 100 DNA fragments from chromatin. The aim of the study was to successively decrease the amount of analyzed chromatin in order to investigate the lower limits of this technology in regard to sensitivity and specificity of detection. The Drosophila GAGA transcription factor was used as an established model system. The protein has already been analyzed in several large-scale CHIP experiments and antibodies of excellent specificity are available. The results of the study revealed that this approach is not easily applicable to "real-world" biological samples in regard to volume reduction and specificity. Particularly, material that non-specifically adsorbed to capillary surfaces outweighed the specific antibody-antigen interaction, the system was designed for. It became clear that complex biological structures, such as chromatin-protein compositions, are not as easily accessible by techniques based on chemically modified glass surfaces as pre-purified samples. In the case of the investigated system, it became evident that there is a need for more research that goes beyond the scope of this work. It is necessary to develop novel coatings and materials to prevent non-specific adsorption. In addition to improving existing techniques, fundamentally new concepts, such as microstructures in biocompatible polymers or liquid transport on hydrophobic stripes on planar substrates to minimize surface contact, may also help to advance the miniaturization of biological experiments.