Diffraction effects in entanglement of two distant atoms

We investigate the process of entanglement creation between two distant atoms coupled to a single mode cavity. We consider the optical frequency regime and include a possible variation of the coupling strength of the atoms to the cavity field with the location of the atoms inside the cavity mode. We show that the degree of entanglement between the atoms is a sensitive function of the position of the atoms inside the mode. It is found that the entanglement exhibits an interesting phenomenon of diffraction when the the atoms are located between the nodes and antinodes of the cavity mode. The entanglement diffraction pattern varies with time and we explain this effect in terms of the quantum property of complementarity, which is manifested as a tradeoff between the knowledge of energy of the exchanged photon versus the evolution time of the system. Entangled states of the system are identified and the entanglement properties of the system are interpreted in terms of the coherence between the atoms.