Semiconductor Theory

We report on the coherent phase manipulation of quantum dot excitons by electric means. For our experiments, we use a low capacitance single quantum dot photodiode which is electrically controlled by a custom designed SiGe:C BiCMOS chip. The phase manipulation is performed and quantified in a Ramsey experiment, where ultrafast transient detuning of the exciton energy is performed synchronous to double pulse p/2 ps laser excitation. We are able to demonstrate electrically controlled phase manipulations with magnitudes up to 3p within 100 ps which is below the dephasing time of the quantum dot exciton.

We successfully developed a process to fabricate freestanding cubic aluminium nitride (c-AlN) membranes containing cubic gallium nitride (c-GaN) quantum dots (QDs). The samples were grown by plasma assisted molecular beam epitaxy (MBE). To realize the photonic crystal (PhC) membrane we have chosen a triangular array of holes. The array was fabricated by electron beam lithography and several steps of reactive ion etching (RIE) with the help of a hard mask and an undercut of the active layer. The r/a- ratio of 0.35 was deter- mined by numerical simulations to obtain a preferably wide photonic band gap. Micro-photoluminescence (μ-PL) measurements of the photonic crystals, in particular of a H1 and a L3 cavity, and the emission of the QD ensemble were performed to characterize the samples. The PhCs show high quality factors of 4400 for the H1 cavity and about 5000/3000 for two different modes of the L3 cavity, respectively. The energy of the fundamental modes is in good agreement to the numerical simulations.

The coherent state preparation and control of single quantum systems is an important prerequisite for the implementation of functional quantum devices. Prominent examples for such systems are semiconductor quantum dots, which exhibit a fine structure split single exciton state and a V-type three level structure, given by a common ground state and two distinguishable and separately excitable transitions. In this work we introduce a novel concept for the preparation of a robust inversion by the sequential excitation in a V-type system via distinguishable paths.

Microresonators containing quantum dots find application in devices like single photon emitters for quantum information technology as well as low threshold laser devices. We demonstrate the fabrication of 60 nm thin zinc-blende AlN microdisks including cubic GaN quantum dots using dry chemical etching techniques. Scanning electron microscopy analysis reveals the morphology with smooth surfaces of the microdisks. Micro-photoluminescence measurements exhibit optically active quantum dots. Furthermore this is the first report of resonator modes in the emission spectrum of a cubic AlN microdisk.

Whispering gallery modes (WGMs) were observed in 60 nm thin cubic AlN microdisk resonators containing a single layer of non-polar cubic GaN quantum dots. Freestanding microdisks were patterned by means of electron beam lithography and a two step reactive ion etching process. Micro-photoluminescence spectroscopy investigations were performed for optical characterization. We analyzed the mode spacing for disk diameters ranging from 2-4 lm. Numerical investigations using three dimensional finite difference time domain calculations were in good agreement with the experimental data. Whispering gallery modes of the radial orders 1 and 2 were identified by means of simulated mode field distributions.

Using a finite-difference time-domain method, we theoretically investigate the optical spectra of crossing perpendicular photonic crystal waveguides with quantum dots embedded in the central rod. The waveguides are designed so that the light mainly propagates along one direction and the cross talk is greatly reduced in the transverse direction. It is shown that when a quantum dot (QD) is resonant with the cavity, strong coupling can be observed via both the transmission and crosstalk spectrum. If the cavity is far off-resonant from the QD, both the cavity mode and the QD signal can be detected in the transverse direction since the laser field is greatly suppressed in this direction. This structure could have strong implications for resonant excitation and in-plane detection of QD optical spectroscopy.

We study the quantum properties and statistics of photons emitted by a quantum-dot biexciton inside a cavity. In the biexciton-exciton cascade, fine-structure splitting between exciton levels degrades polarization-entanglement for the emitted pair of photons. However, here we show that the polarization-entanglement can be preserved in such a system through simultaneous emission of two degenerate photons into cavity modes tuned to half the biexciton energy. Based on detailed theoretical calculations for realistic quantum-dot and cavity parameters, we quantify the degree of achievable entanglement.

The intensity dependence of optically-induced injection currents in unbiased GaAs semiconductor quantum wells grown in [110] direction is investigated theoretically for a number of well widths. Our microscopic analysis is based on a 14 x 14 band k . p method in combination with the multisubband semiconductor Bloch equations. An oscillatory dependence of the injection current transients as function of intensity and time is predicted and explained. It is demonstrated that optical excitations involving different subbands and Rabi flopping are responsible for this complex dynamics.

We demonstrate by spin quantum beat spectroscopy that in undoped symmetric (110)-oriented GaAs/AlGaAs single quantum wells, even a symmetric spatial envelope wave function gives rise to an asymmetric in-plane electron Land´e g-factor. The anisotropy is neither a direct consequence of the asymmetric in-plane Dresselhaus splitting nor a direct consequence of the asymmetric Zeeman splitting of the hole bands, but rather it is a pure higher-order effect that exists as well for diamond-type lattices. The measurements for various well widths are very well described within 14 × 14 band k·p theory and illustrate that the electron spin is an excellent meter variable for mapping out the internal—otherwise hidden—symmetries in two-dimensional systems. Fourth-order perturbation theory yields an analytical expression for the strength of the g-factor anisotropy, providing a qualitative understanding of the observed effects.

The injection of photocurrents by femtosecond laser pulses in (110)-orientedGaAs/AlGaAs quantum wells is investigated theoretically and experimentally. The roomtemperature measurements show an oscillatory dependence of the injection current amplitude and direction on the excitation photon energy. Microscopic calculations using the semiconductor Bloch equations that are set up on the basis of k.p band structure calculations provide a detailed understanding of the experimental findings.

We study the influence of the phonon environment on the electron dynamics in a doped quantum dot molecule. A non-perturbative quantumkinetic theory based on correlation expansion is used in order to describe both diagonal and off-diagonal electron-phonon couplings representing real and virtual processes with relevant acoustic phonons. We show that the relaxation is dominated by phononassisted electron tunneling between constituent quantum dots and occurs on a picosecond time scale. The dependence of the time evolution of the quantum dot occupation probabilities on the energy mismatch between the quantum dots is studied in detail.

Microdisks made from GaAs with embedded InAs quantum dots are immersed in the liquid crystal 4-cyano-4’-pentylbiphenyl (5CB). The quantum dots serve as emitters feeding the optical modes of the photonic cavity. By changing temperature, the liquid crystal undergoes a phase transition from the isotropic to the nematic state, which can be used as an effective tuning mechanism of the photonic modes of the cavity. In the nematic state, the uniaxial electrical anisotropy of the liquid crystal molecules can be exploited for orienting the material in an electric field, thus externally controlling the birefringence of the material. Using this effect, an electric field induced tuning of the modes is achieved. Numerical simulations using the finite-differences time-domain (FDTD) technique employing an anisotropic dielectric medium allow to understand the alignment of the liquid crystal molecules on the surface of the microdisk resonator.

Excitonic spectra of weakly disordered semiconductor heterostructures are simulated on the basis of a one-dimensional tight-binding model. The influence of the length scale of weak disorder in quantum wells on the redshift of the excitonic peak and its linewidth is studied. By calculating two-dimensional Fouriertransform spectra we are able to determine the contribution of disorder to inhomogeneous and also to homogeneous broadenings separately. This disorder-induced dephasing is related to a Fano-type coupling and leads to contributions to the homogeneous linewidth that depends on energy within the inhomogeneously broadened line. The model includes heavy- and light-hole excitons and yields smaller inhomogeneous broadening for the light-hole exciton if compared to the heavy-hole exciton, which agrees qualitatively with the experiment.

It is demonstrated that valence-band mixing in GaAs quantum wells tremendously modifies electronic transport. A coherent control scheme in which ultrafast currents are optically injected into undoped GaAs quantum wells upon excitation with femtosecond laser pulses is employed. An oscillatory dependence of the injection current amplitude and direction on the excitation photon energy is observed. A microscopic theoretical analysis shows that this current reversal is caused by the coupling of the light- and heavy-hole bands and that the hole currents dominate the overall current response. These surprising consequences of band mixing illuminate fundamental physics as they are unique for experiments which are able to monitor electronic transport resulting from carriers with relatively large momenta.

The dynamics of charge and spin injection currents excited by circularly polarized, one-color laser beams in semiconductor quantum wells is analyzed. Our microscopic approach is based on a 14x14 k · p band-structure theory in combination with multisubband semiconductor Bloch equations which allows a detailed analysis of the photogenerated carrier distributions and coherences in k space. Charge and spin injection currents are numerically calculated for [110]- and [001]-grown GaAs quantum wells including dc population contributions and ac contributions that arise from intersubband coherences. The dependencies of the injection currents on the excitation conditions, in particular, the photon energy are computed and discussed.

GaAs-based semiconductor microdisks with high quality whispering gallery modes (Q44000) have been fabricated.A layer of self-organized InAs quantumdots (QDs) served as a light source to feed the optical modes at room temperature. In order to achieve frequency tuning of the optical modes, the microdisk devices have been immersed in 4 – cyano – 4´-pentylbiphenyl (5CB), a liquid crystal(LC) with a nematic phase below the clearing temperature of TC≈34°C .We have studied the device performance in the temperature rangeof T=20-50°C, in order to investigate the influence of the nematic–isotropic phase transition on the optical modes. Moreover,we havea pplied an AC electric field to the device,which leads in the nematic phase to a reorientation of the anisotropic dielectric tensor of the liquid crystal.This electrical anisotropy can be used to achieve electrical tunability of the optical modes.Using the finite-difference time domain (FDTD) technique with an anisotropic material model, we are able to describe the influence of the liquid crystal qualitatively.

A quantum dot molecule doped with a single electron in the presence of diagonal and off-diagonal carrierphonon couplings is studied by means of a nonperturbative quantum kinetic theory. The interaction with acoustic phonons by deformation potential and piezoelectric coupling is taken into account. We show that the phonon-mediated relaxation is fast on a picosecond time scale and is dominated by the usually neglected off-diagonal coupling to the lattice degrees of freedom leading to phonon-assisted electron tunneling. We show that in the parameter regime of current electrical and optical experiments, the microscopic non-Markovian theory has to be employed.

We study a single quantum dot molecule doped with one electron in the presence of electron-phonon coupling. Both diagonal and off-diagonal interactions representing real and virtual processes with acoustic phonons via deformation potential and piezoelectric coupling are taken into account. We employ a non-perturbative quantum kinetic theory and show that the phonon-mediated relaxation is dominated by an electron tunneling on a picosecond time scale.A dependence of the relaxation on the temperature and the strength of the tunneling coupling is analyzed.

We demonstrate that an optically driven spin of a carrier in a quantum dot undergoes indirect dephasing via conditional optically induced charge evolution even in the absence of any direct interaction between the spin and its environment. A generic model for the indirect dephasing with a three-component system with spin, charge, and reservoir is proposed. This indirect decoherence channel is studied for the optical spin manipulation in a quantum dot with a microscopic description of the charge-phonon interaction taking into account its non-Markovian nature.

Phonon-assisted singlet-singlet relaxation in semiconductor quantum dot molecules is studied theoretically. Laterally coupled quantum dot structures doped with two electrons are considered. We take into account interaction with acoustic phonon modes via deformation potential and piezoelectric coupling. We show that piezoelectric mechanism for the considered system is of great importance and for some ranges of quantum dot molecule parameters is the dominant contribution to relaxation. It is shown that the phonon-assisted tunneling is much faster (down to ∼ 6 ps even at zero temperature) in comparison with other decoherence processes. The influence of Coulomb interaction is discussed and its consequences are indicated. We calculate the relaxation rates for GaAs quantum dot molecules and study the dependence on quantum dot size, distance and offset between the constituent quantum dots. In addition the temperature dependence of the tunneling rates is analyzed.

We present phase-resolved pulse propagation measurements that allow us to fully describe the transition between several light–matter interaction regimes. The complete range from linear excitation to the breakdown of the photonic bandgap on to self-induced transmission and self-phase modulation is studied on a high-quality multiple-quantum-well Bragg structure. An improved fast-scanning cross-correlation frequency-resolved optical gating setup is applied to retrieve the pulse phase with an excellent signal-tonoise ratio. Calculations using the semiconductor Maxwell–Bloch equations show qualitative agreement with the experimental findings.

We study phonon-assisted electron tunneling in semiconductor quantum dot molecules. In particular, singletsinglet relaxation in a two-electron-doped structure is considered. The influence of Coulomb interaction is discussed via comparison with a single-electron system. We find that the relaxation rate reaches similar values in the two cases but the Coulomb interaction shifts the maximum rates toward larger separations between the dots. The difference in electron-phonon interaction between deformation potential and piezoelectric coupling is investigated. We show that the phonon-induced tunneling between two-electron singlet states is a fast process, taking place on the time scales of the order of a few tens of picoseconds.

We investigate the optical properties of a Coulomb-coupled double-quantum dot system excited by coherent light pulses. Basic effects of Coulomb coupling regarding linear and nonlinear optical processes are discussed. By numerically solving the Heisenberg equation of motion we are able to present the temporal evolution of the system’s density matrix for a wide range of coupling parameters. The two main coupling effects in dipole approximation, biexcitonic shift and Förster energy transfer, are investigated and their qualitative and quantitative influence on absorption spectra, Rabi oscillations, and single- and two-pulse excitation is discussed. We present simulated differential transmission spectra to allow for comparison with recent experimental studies.

We theoretically study the biexciton-phonon interaction in strongly confined semiconductor quantum dots. For spectrally narrow single-pulse excitation generation of biexcitonic occupations is only possible via a two-photon cascade, which exhibits renormalized Rabi oscillations and spectrally compressed phononsidebands.

We demonstrate that the temporal pulse phase remains essentially unaltered before separate phase characteristics are developed when propagating high-intensity pulses coherently on the exciton resonance of an optically thick semiconductor. This behavior is a clear manifestation of self-induced transmission and pulse breakup into solitonlike pulses due to Rabi flopping of the carrier density. Experiments using a novel fast-scan cross-correlation frequency-resolved optical gating (XFROG) method are in good agreement with numerical calculations based on the semiconductor Bloch equations.

Using a fully quantized description of strongly confined electrons interacting with acoustic phonons and the photon field, the nonstationary resonance-fluorescence spectra of a semiconductor quantum dot are investigated. For excitation pulses with durations approaching typical electron-phonon scattering times, the virtual quantum processes yield an observable electron-phonon sideband broadening.

The interaction of electrons with LO phonons provides an important mechanism of optical dephasing and carrier scattering for the two-dimensional electron gas in semiconductor quantum wells. In this paper, the corresponding ultrafast nonlinearities for off-resonant and resonant intersubband excitations are investigated. Quantum kinetic effects of the electron-phonon interaction and the corresponding violation of the microscopic energy conservation yield a qualitative different picture compared to the standard Markovian theory, if the phonon energy is larger than the intersubband-gap energy.

We present a theory of the optical line shape of coherent intersubband transitions in a semiconductor quantum well, considering non-Markovian LO-phonon scattering as major broadening mechanism. We show that a quantum kinetic approach leads to additional polaron resonances and a resonance enhancement for gap energies close to the phonon energy.

The adiabatic driving of the resonant electron dynamics in a one-dimensional resonant photonic band gap is proposed as an optical mechanism for nonlinear ultrafast switching. Pulsed excitation inside the photonic gap results in an ultrafast suppression and recovery of the gap. This behavior results from the adiabatic carrier dynamics due to rapid radiative damping inside the band gap.

We investigate the temporal and spectral properties of subpicosecond pulses transmitted on the heavy-hole exciton transition through a multiple-quantum-well Bragg structure, exhibiting a one-dimensional photonic band gap. At low light intensities, a temporal propagation beating is observed. This beating is strongly dependent on the optical dephasing time T2 which is dominated by the radiative interwell coupling. In an intermediate intensity regime, the Pauli-blocking nonlinearity leads to gradual suppression of the photonic band gap and vanishing of the linear propagation beating. For highly nonlinear excitation, we find signatures of selfinduced transmission due to Rabi flopping and adiabatic following of the carrier density. Numerical simulations using the semiconductor Maxwell-Bloch equations are in excellent agreement with the experimental data up to intensities for which higher many-particle correlations become more important and self-phase modulation occurs in the sample substrate.

We present the experimental observation and the theoretical modelling of self-induced transparency signatures such as nonlinear transmission, pulse retardation and reshaping for subpicosecond pulse propagation in a 2 mm-long InGaAs quantum-dot ridge waveguide at 10 K. The measurements were obtained using a cross-correlation frequency resolved optical gating technique which allows us to retrieve the field amplitude of the propagating pulses.

We outline a theoretical description of the absorption linewidth of quantum well intersubband transitions by solving Maxwell’s equations for a non-local susceptibility including many particle effects. We show that the intersubband absorption results from a complex interplay between mean-field effects, dephasing contributions and light propagation effects, all being very sensitive to subband dispersion.

The phonon-induced dephasing dynamics of semiconductor quantum dots during nonlinear optical excitation is studied using quantum kinetic equations. We find that despite the decoherence process Rabi oscillations occur even for relatively long pulse durations and that their signatures in pump-probe experiments only get suppressed for high input pulse areas.

We report the experimental observation and the theoretical modeling of self-induced-transparency signatures such as nonlinear transmission, pulse retardation and reshaping, for subpicosecond pulse propagation in a 2-mm-long InGaAs quantum-dot ridge waveguide in resonance with the excitonic ground-state transition at 10 K. The measurements were obtained by using a cross-correlation frequency-resolved optical gating technique which allows us to retrieve the field amplitude of the propagating pulses.

The nonlinear propagation of subpicosecond pulses resonant to the hh 1s exciton in Bragg-periodic multiple quantum wells is investigated experimentally and theoretically. We show coherent pulse breakup and its suppression for increasing pulse intensity in good agreement with calculations based on the semiconductor Maxwell-Bloch equations. For highly nonlinear excitation, pulse compression is observed which is strongly enhanced by the additional contribution of self-phase modulation in the barrier and substrate material.