We present a theory of dressed-state lasers, i.e., lasers that operate on an inverted transition between dressed states of a coupled atom-field system, in the bad-cavity limit. We discuss the validity of the effective Hamiltonian approach in such a case and generalize the theory beyond secular and effective Hamiltonian approximations. We demonstrate that higher-order instabilities that lead to self-pulsing and optical chaos may occur in experiments on dressed-state lasers. With the help of the generalized theory we study the competition between the resonant one-photon and two-photon processes and try to understand it physically by looking at the spectrum of the emitted radiation.

• Received 31 May 1991

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevA.45.2057