Optical control of collective states in one-dimensional ordered atomic chains beyond the linear regime

Driven by the need to develop efficient atom-photon interfaces, recent efforts have proposed replacing cavities by large arrays of cold atoms that can support subradiant or superradiant collective states. In practice, subradiant states are decoupled from radiation, which constitutes a hurdle to most applications. In this work, we study theoretically a protocol that bypasses this limit using a one dimensional chain composed of N three-level atoms in a V-shaped configuration. Throughout the protocol, the chain behaves as a time-varying metamaterial: enabling absorption, storage, and on-demand emission in a spectrally and spatially controlled mode. Taking into account the quantum nature of atoms, we establish the boundary between the linear regime and the nonlinear regime. In the nonlinear regime, we demonstrate that doubly excited states can be coherently transferred from superradiant to subradiant states, opening the way to the optical characterization of their entanglement.