Transmission Spectrum of an Optical Cavity Containing N Atoms

Abstract

The transmission spectrum of a high-finesse optical cavity containing an arbitrary number of trapped atoms is presented. We take spatial and motional effects into account and show that in the limit of strong coupling, the important spectral features can be determined for an arbitrary number of atoms, N. We also show that these results have important ramifications in limiting our ability to determine the number of atoms in the cavity.