Autler-Townes effect in a strongly driven electromagnetically induced transparency resonance

In this paper we study the nonlinear behavior of an electromagnetically induced transparency (EIT) resonance subject to a coherent driving field. The EIT is associated with a Lambda three-level system where two hyperfine levels within an electronic ground state are coupled to a common excited state level by a coupling field and a probe field. In addition there is an radio-frequency (rf) field driving a hyperfine transition within the ground state. The paper contrasts two different situations. In one case the rf-driven transition shares a common level with the probed transition and in the second case it shares a common level with the coupled transition. In both cases the EIT resonance is split into a doublet and the characteristics of the EIT doublet are determined by the strength and frequency of the rf-driving field. The doublet splitting originates from the rf-field induced dynamic Stark effect and has close analogy with the Autler-Townes effect observed in three-level pump-probe spectroscopy study. The situation changes when the rf field is strong and the two cases are very different. One is analogous to two Lambda three-level systems with EIT resonance associated with each. The other corresponds to a doubly driven three-level system with rf-field-induced electromagnetically induced absorption resonance. The two situations are modeled using numerical solutions of the relevant equation of motion of density matrix. In addition a physical account of their behaviors is given in terms of a dressed state picture.