Photon Aided and Inhibited Tunneling of Photons

Abstract

In the light of the interest in the transport of single photons in arrays of waveguides, fiber couplers, photonic crystals, etc., we consider the quantum mechanical process of the tunneling of photons through evanescently or otherwise coupled structures. We specifically examine the issue of tunneling between two structures when one structure already contains few photons. We demonstrate the possibility of both photon aided and inhibited tunneling of photons. The Bosonic nature of photons enhances the tunneling probability. We also show how the multiphoton tunneling probability can be either enhanced or inhibited due to the presence of photons. We find similar results for the higher order tunneling. Finally, we show that the presence of a squeezed field changes the nature of tunneling considerably.