Objective
In the present proposal leading groups from different western European countries and Russia plan to address systematically linear and nonlinear optical properties of semiconductor micro-cavities. Planar (2D) microcavities as well as fully spatially confined (0D) single photonic dots and photonic dot arrays will be investigated. These system have received a lot of attention recently, due to the possibility to study strong interaction effects between excitons and photons. In addition 0D photonic dots permit to control the spontaneous emission probability with a previously inaccessible efficiency. These structures have also a large potential for optoelectronic applications including vertical cavity lasers with ultra low threshold currents.
The proposal combines the complementary expertise of the western partners of the consortium mainly relating to technology and characterization of the structures, with the experimental and theoretical skills of highly qualified Russian groups.
The main objective of the experimental and theoretical studies of this proposal is to provide a physical description of the linear and nonlinear optical response in 2D and 0D microcavities based on InGaAlAs and GaAlSb structures. A detailed understanding of the material and size dependence of the Rabi splitting primarily in 0D resonators will be attempted. Furthermore coupled modes involving spatially extended excitons (e.g. excitons formed by electrons and holes in different layers of coupled double or triple quantum wells) will be studied. These systems should exhibit a pronounced tunability in external electric and magnetic fields.
Of particular interest are experimental and theoretical studies of electromagnetic coupling effects between different photonic dots in arrays with varying number of dots (2 - 1000). The optical spectra of these photonic dot arrays should permit to investigate the transition from an isolated dot (atom) via a few optically coupled dots (molle) to a 2D photonic crystal.
A systematic theoretical investigation of nonlinear electronic polarization effects in microcavities will be carried out regarding bandstructure changes due to strong electromagnetic fields. Resonant short pulse experiments will be used to investigate e.g. the formation of a light induced gap in the band structure.
The kinetics of photon and exciton modes in 2D and 0D semiconductor microcavities will be investigated by ps and ps spectroscopy and theory for the different material systems. By the evaluation of e.g. temperature and excitation intensity/energy dependent experiments the dominant relaxation and recombination processes in the microcavities will be studied.
Technology, experiments and theory will be carried out in a very close collaboration. Due to the expertise of the participating groups in the key areas of the present proposal one can expect a very fruitful and efficient scientific cooperation.
Topic(s)
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97074 Würzburg
Germany