Investigation of odd-order nonlinear susceptibilities in atomic vapors

• The macroscopic symmetry constraints are deduced for homogeneous media including atomic vapors.
• We demonstrate that odd-order nonlinear susceptibilities satisfy the constraints.
• We experimentally demonstrate the deduction in part.

We theoretically deduce the macroscopic symmetry constraints for arbitrary odd-order nonlinear susceptibilities in homogeneous media including atomic vapors for the first time. After theoretically calculating the expressions using a semiclassical method, we demonstrate that the expressions for third- and fifth-order nonlinear susceptibilities for undressed and dressed four- and six-wave mixing (FWM and SWM) in atomic vapors satisfy the macroscopic symmetry constraints. We experimentally demonstrate consistence between the macroscopic symmetry constraints and the semiclassical expressions for atomic vapors by observing polarization control of FWM and SWM processes. The experimental results are in reasonable agreement with our theoretical calculations.