@article{7643, author = {C. Cleff and P. Groß and C. Fallnich and H. L. Offerhaus and J. Herek and K. Kruse and W. P. Beeker and C. J. Lee and K. J. Boller}, title = {Ground-state depletion for subdiffraction-limited spatial resolution in coherent anti-Stokes Raman}, abstract = {We theoretically investigate ground-state depletion for subdiffraction-limited spatial resolution in coherent anti-Stokes Raman scattering (CARS) microscopy. We propose a scheme based on ground-state depopulation, which is achieved via a control laser light field incident prior to the CARS excitation light fields. This ground-state depopulation results in a reduced CARS signal generation. With an appropriate choice of spatial beam profiles, the scheme can be used to increase the spatial resolution. Based on the density matrix formalism we calculate the CARS signal generation and find a CARS signal suppression by 75% due to ground-state depletion with a single control light field and by using two control light fields the CARS signal suppression can be enhanced to 94%. Additional control light fields will enhance the CARS suppression even further. In case of a single control light field we calculate resulting CARS images using a computer-generated test image including quantum and detector noise and show that the background from the limited CARS suppression can be removed by calculating difference images, yielding subdiffraction-limited resolution where the resolution achievable depends only on the intensity used.}, year = {2012}, journal = {PHYSICAL REVIEW A}, volume = {86}, chapter = {023825}, pages = {023825}, month = {Aug-2012}, publisher = {American Physical Society}, url = {http://link.aps.org/doi/10.1103/PhysRevA.86.023825}, doi = {10.1103/PhysRevA.86.023825}, language = {eng}, }