Stimulated emission energy of an absorbed photon causes an identical but opposite atomic transition: from the lower level to a higher energy level. In normal media at thermal equilibrium, absorption exceeds stimulated emission because there are more electrons in the lower energy states than in the higher energy states. However, when a population inversion is present, the rate of stimulated emission exceeds that of absorption, and a net optical amplification can be achieved. Such a gain medium, along with an optical resonator, is at the heart of a laser or maser. Lacking a feedback mechanism, laser amplifiers and superluminescent sources also function
Sound amplification by stimulated emission of radiation Therefore, amplification and cooling occur around a tunable line center, in contrast with some cavity optomechanical phenomena. The creation of these finely spaced levels does not require increasing the optical microcavity dimensions. Hence, these finely spaced levels do not affect the optomechanical interaction strength in a significant degree. The approach uses intermodal coupling, induced by radiation pressure and can also provide a spectrally selective mean to detect phonons. Moreover, some evidences of intermodal cooling are observed in this kind of experiments and thus, there is an interest in optomechanical cooling. Overall, an extension to multilevel systems using multiple coupled resonators