Splitting of atomic wave packets under multizone Raman excitation

A multizone excitation of a double Λ-system with three lower and two excited states (the so-called M-atom) by an optical radiation field is presented. It is shown that the Raman excitation of such a system can be used to implement an effective atomic beam splitter in one of the lower states. The advantage of the scheme under consideration is that the formation of a space lattice of the atomic density takes place when the atomic system interacts only with the optical radiation field and does not require any additional efforts to select the internal states in which such spatial structures are formed.