FLUORESCENCE INTO FLAT AND STRUCTURED RADIATION CONTINUA - AN ATOMIC DENSITY-MATRIX WITHOUT A MASTER EQUATION

We investigate an atomic Lambda system with one transition coupled to a laser field and a flat continuum of vacuum modes and the other trans ition coupled to field modes near the edge of a photonic band gap. The system requires simultaneous treatment of Markovian and non-Markovian dissipation processes, but the photonic-band-gap continuum cannot be eliminated within a density matrix treatment. Instead we propose a for malism based on Monte Carlo wave functions, and we present results rel evant to the experimental characterization of a structured continuum.