Comparison of Electromagnetically Induced Transparency in lambda, cascade and vee three-level systems

Abstract: We discuss the Electromagnetically Induced Transparency (EIT) in lambda, cascade and vee type three-level systems where the Hamiltonian and the Lindblad term of each configuration are expressed in the $SU(3)$ representation. At steady state, the Optical Bloch Equations of each configuration are solved to obtain the dispersion and absorption profiles of the probe field along with their group velocities. When the EIT condition is achieved at resonance, the population oscillation shows which of the bare states are contributing to form the dark state. Our study reveals that the dark state for the lambda and cascade system effectively coincides with the lowest bare state of that system, while for the vee system, it is a maximally superposed state of the middle and upper bare states.