  We analyzed the efficiency of coherent population trapping (CPT) in a
superposition of the ground states of three-level atoms under the influence of
the decoherence process induced by a broadband thermal field. We showed that in
a single atom there is no perfect CPT when the atomic transitions are affected
by the thermal field. The perfect CPT may occur when only one of the two atomic
transitions is affected by the thermal field. In the case when both atomic
transitions are affected by the thermal field, we demonstrated that regardless
of the intensity of the thermal field the destructive effect on the CPT can be
circumvented by the collective behavior of the atoms. An analytic expression
was obtained for the populations of the upper atomic levels which can be
considered as a measure of the level of thermal decoherence. The results show
that the collective interaction between the atoms can significantly enhance the
population trapping in that the population of the upper state decreases with
increased number of atoms. The physical origin of this feature was explained by
the semiclassical dressed atom model of the system. We introduced the concept
of multiatom collective coherent population trapping by demonstrating the
existence of collective (entangled) states whose storage capacity is larger
than that of the equivalent states of independent atoms.
