We study the coherent light-matter interactions of GaAs quantum wells associated with excitons, biexcitons and many-body effects. For most polarization configurations, excitonic features dominate the phase-resolved two-dimensional Fourier-transform (
2DFT) spectra and have dispersive lineshapes, indicating the presence of many-body interactions. For cross-linear excitation, excitonic features become weak and absorptive due to the strong suppression of many-body effects; a result that can not be directly determined in transient four-wave mixing experiments. The biexcitonic features do not weaken for cross-polarized excitation and thus are more important.
A combination of spatial interference patterns and spectral interferometry are used to find the global phase for non-collinear two-dimensional Fourier-transform (2DFT) spectra. Results are compared with those using the spectrally resolved transient a
bsorption (STRA) method to find the global phase when excitation is with co-linear polarization. Additionally cross-linear polarized 2DFT spectra are correctly phased using the all-optical technique, where the SRTA is not applicable.
We report the observation of double-quantum coherence signals in a gas of potassium atoms at twice the frequency of the one-quantum coherences. Since a single atom does not have a state at the corresponding energy, this observation must be attributed
to a collective resonance involving multiple atoms. These resonances are induced by weak inter-atomic dipole-dipole interactions, which means that the atoms cannot be treated in isolation, even at a low density of $10^{12}$ cm$^{-3}$.
