Photon Echo Quantum Memory for Arbitrary Non-Stationary Light Fields

We develop the theory of an optical quantum memory protocol based on the three pulse photon echo (PE) in an optically dense medium with controlled reversible inhomogeneous broadening (CRIB). The wave-function of the retrieved photon echo field is derived explicitly as a function of an arbitrary input Data light field. The storage and retrieval of time-bin qubit states based on the described quantum memory is discussed, and it is shown that the memory allows to measure the path length difference in an imbalanced interferometer using short light pulses.