Variation of the absorption and dispersion profiles in a ladder-four-level system

A theoretical research on the variation of the absorption and dispersion profiles and population distribution of each level in a ladder-four-level system driven by two coherent fields has been made. Whether the variation occurs or not depends on the effect of quantum interference, the detuning of the upper coherent field and the separation of the two intermediate levels. A dressed-state analysis is introduced to explain the numerical results.