The livermore experience: Contributions of J. H. Eberly to laser excitation theory

This article summarizes the developing understanding of coherent atomic exc itation, as gained through a collaboration of J. H. Eberly with the Laser I sotope Separation Program of the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, pa rticularly aspects of coherence, population trapping, multilevel multiphoto n excitation sequences, analytic solutions to multistate excitation chains, the quasicontinuum, pulse propagation, and noise. In addition to the disco very of several curious and unexpected properties of coherent excitation, m entioned here, the collaboration provided an excellent example of unexpecte d benefits from investment into basic research. (C) 2001 Optical Society of America.