Interwell excitons in GaAs/AlGaAs double quantum wells and their collective properties

Luminescence spectra of interwell excitons in GaAs/AlGaAs double quantum wells with electric-field-tilted bands (n-i-n) structures were studied. In these structures the electron and the hole in the interwell exciton are spatially separated between neighboring quantum wells by a narrow AlAs barrier. Under resonant excitation by circularly polarized light the luminescence line of the interwell excitons exhibited appreciable narrowing as their concentration increased and the degree of circular polarization of the photoluminescence increased substantially. Under resonant excitation by linearly polarized light the alignment of the interwell excitons increased as a threshold process with increasing optical pumping. By analyzing time-resolved spectra and the kinetics of the photoluminescence intensity under pulsed excitation it was established that under these conditions the rate of radiative recombination increases substantially. The observed effect occurs at below-critical temperatures and is interpreted in terms of the collective behavior of the interwell excitons. Studies of the luminescence spectra in a magnetic field showed that the collective exciton phase is dielectric and in this phase the interwell excitons retain their individual properties.     

Photo-induced magnetic polarons in semiconductors

Exciton magnetic polarons observed in dilute magnetic semiconductors were investigated by steady-state and pico-second time-resolved photoluminescence measurements and have shown characteristic behavior of exciton localization processes in bulk-Cd_1-x Mn _x Te and also in the quantum structures composed of the dilute magnetic semiconductors. For the quantum structures spin-dependent coherent polarizations associated with excitons and biexcitons were studied by degenerate four-wave mixing experiment. Also investigated for different chalcogenide spinel ferromagnetic semiconductors was photo-induced enhancement of exchange interaction between magnetic ions by direct magnetic flux detection in the vicinity of the Curie temperatures.     

Exciton condensate emission in double quantum wells

Studies of the photoluminescence spectra of spatially indirect excitons in coupled quantum wells revealed that the emission has a directional pattern dependent on the external electric field and pumping power. The experimentally detected correlation between the spectral emission parameters of spatially indirect excitons, namely, the concentration (phase state) of such excitons, the line half-width, the degree of linear polarization, and the existence of a directional pattern, permits a suggestion that the spontaneous photoluminescence of spatially indirect excitons in the condensed state is of a coherent nature.     

Collective behavior of interwell excitons in GaAs/AlGaAs double quantum wells

Photoluminescence spectra of interwell excitons in double GaAs/AlGaAs quantum wells (n-i-n structures) have been investigated (an interwell exciton in these systems is an electron-hole pair spatially separated by a narrow AlAs barrier). Under resonance excitation by circularly polarized light, the luminescence line of interwell excitons exhibits a significant narrowing and a drastic increase in the degree of circular polarization of photoluminescence with increasing exciton concentration. It is found that the radiative recombination rate significantly increases under these conditions. This phenomenon is observed at temperatures lower than the critical point and can be interpreted in terms of the collective behavior of interwell excitons.     

Coherence length of excitons in a semiconductor quantum well

We report on the first experimental determination of the coherence length of excitons in semiconductors using the combination of spatially resolved photoluminescence with phonon sideband spectroscopy. The coherence length of excitons in ZnSe quantum wells is determined to be 300-400 nm, about 25-30 times the exciton de Broglie wavelength. With increasing exciton kinetic energy, the coherence length decreases slowly. The discrepancy between the coherence lengths measured and calculated by considering only the acoustic-phonon scattering suggests an important influence of static disorder.     

Polarization instability in a polariton system in semiconductor microcavities

The kinetics of a field on a quantum well in the active region of a planar microcavity with strong exciton-photon coupling has been investigated under the conditions of resonance pulse excitation by a small degree of circular polarization. It has been shown that the system of polaritons at the early stage of the development of instability induced by polariton-polariton interaction tends to transit to a circularly polarized state, but does not reach 100% circular polarization and returns to a polarized state whose polarization is close to the pump polarization. It has been shown that the observed effects are caused by the excitation of an unpolarized reservoir of excitons in quantum wells, which leads to fast relaxation of the difference between the effective resonance frequencies of excitons with different circular polarizations.     

Spectroscopy of polarized luminescence of nanostructures

The effect of different distortions arising in nanostructures and of external fields on polarization of radiation has been studied. Occurrence of linear polarization of photoluminescence in a magnetic field applied in the plane of a structure containing a CdTe/CdMnTe quantum well has been considered. The influence of a magnetic field on the effects of optical orientation and optical alignment of excitons and trions in self-assembled CdSe/ZnSe quantum dots has been investigated. Analysis of the experimental data reveals low symmetry of the structures studied. It is shown that the distribution of the anisotropy axes in the plane of nanostructures is nearly random.     

Excitonic effects in diluted magnetic semiconductor nanostructures

Excitonic properties and the dynamics are reported in quantum dots (QDs) and quantum wells (QW) of diluted magnetic semiconductors. Transient spectroscopies of photoluminescence and nonlinear-optical absorption and emission have been made on these quantum nanostructures. The Cd_1−x Mn_xSe QDs show the excitonic magnetic polaron effect with an increased binding energy. The quantum wells of the Cd_1−x Mn_xTe/ZnTe system display fast energy and dephasing relaxations of the free and localized excitons as well as the tunneling process of carriers and excitons in the QWs depending on the barrier widths. The observed dynamics and the enhanced excitonic effects are the inherent properties of the diluted magnetic nanostructures. Fiz. Tverd. Tela (St. Petersburg) 40, 846–848 (May 1998) Published in English in the original Russian journal. Reproduced here with stylistic changes by the Translation Editor.     

调制掺杂ZnSe/BeTe Ⅱ型量子阱结构中的内秉电场和新型带电激子

报道了调制掺杂的ZnSe/BeTe/ZnSe Ⅱ型量子阱(type-Ⅱ QW)在低温(2—5 K)条件下的光致发光(PL),光致发光激发(PLE)和磁性光致发光(magneto-PL)光谱的实验结果.　观察到非掺杂样品的PL有两个很强的主发光峰而掺杂样品只有一个的奇异发光.　PL直线偏振度和PLE的测量结果都表明了这些空间间接型跃迁PL是来自两个异质结界面的贡献,非掺杂样品的两个主发光峰的分离则是起因于QW结构中的内秉电场(built-in electric field).在平行于QW生长方向的强磁场中, 关键词： 光致发光 二维电子气 带电激子 Ⅱ型量子阱     

Spin orientation by optical pumping of strained In0.35Ga0.65As/GaAs quantum wells grown on vicinal substrates

Strained In_0.35Ga_0.65As/GaAs quantum wells of various thicknesses grown on vicinal substrates were studied by optical pumping techniques. From the 4K photoluminescence and photoluminescence excitation results we found that a blue shift of the excitonic lines and an improvement of the optical properties of the samples accompany the misorientation of the substrate. The influence of Indium surface segregation was taken into account to fit the experimental results. The dependence of the circular degree of polarization on the excitation energy allows us to determine the nature of the (11h-1e) transition and to evidence a localization of the excitons on the terraces existing at the interfaces. It was not possible to evaluate the characteristic times governing the photoluminescence polarization.     

Exciton photoluminescence of ZnSe and CdS quantum dots in borosilicate glasses prepared by the sol-gel method

The spectra of exciton photoluminescence (PL) of ZnSe and CdS quantum dots (QDs) synthesized in borosilicate glasses by the sol-gel method are measured and analyzed. It is shown that the positions of the PL bands in the spectra of both systems are related to the spatial quantization of the energy of excitons in QDs. Significant differences in the conditions of this process in ZnSe and CdS QDs are revealed. It is ascertained that, at some critical concentration of the semiconductors (x _cr), exciton percolation levels are formed in both systems, which manifest themselves in an abrupt change in the shape and spectral position of the emission bands of both systems and the constancy of the noted band parameters with a further increase in the concentration. The values of the critical and mean radii of QDs in the stage of their Ostwald ripening are obtained for several concentrations of the doping semiconductors.     

Direct measurement of the hole-nuclear spin interaction in single InP/GaInP quantum dots using photoluminescence spectroscopy

We measure the hyperfine interaction of the valence band hole with nuclear spins in single InP/GaInP semiconductor quantum dots. Detection of photoluminescence (PL) of both "bright" and "dark" excitons enables direct measurement of the Overhauser shift of states with the same electron but opposite hole spin projections. We find that the hole hyperfine constant is ≈11% of that of the electron and has the opposite sign. By measuring the degree of circular polarization of the PL, an upper limit to the contribution of the heavy-light hole mixing to the measured value of the hole hyperfine constant is deduced. Our results imply that environment-independent hole spins are not realizable in III-V semiconductor, a result important for solid-state quantum information processing using hole spin qubits.     

Triplet bound excitons in copper-doped gallium phosphide

This review describes a particular class of neutral defect complexes in GaP, represented by the variety of Cu-related centres, which are observed to bind excitons in a spin-like singlet-triplet configuration. The reasons for this are discussed and two subgroups are defined. One of these consists of centres which bind holes in localized orbitally nondegenerate spin states, but give rise to highly structured optical spectra. The other group is characterized by featureless photoluminescence spectra in the mid-gap spectral region due to a tight binding of both the electron and hole in spin-like states. Both groups are well described with an essentially identical spin-Hamiltonian formalism, as detailed optically detected magnetic resonance measurements have revealed. The relation of this class of neutral defects in GaP to similar complexes in other semiconductors is discussed.     

Excitons and multi-exciton complexes bound to a two-dimensional hole layer at a silicon surface: the Kondo effect,the Coulomb blockade and a negative photoconductivity

The recombination radiation line of surface excitons and the recombination radiation line of multi-exciton complexes bound to a two-dimensional hole layer are observed in luminescence spectra of [100] silicon metal–oxide–semiconductor structures at low two-dimensional hole density. The circular polarization of these two lines in a transverse magnetic field is defined by the average electron spin. The hole spin contribution to the circular polarization is very small due to Kondo spin correlations of holes in the excitons and complexes and holes in the two-dimensional hole layer. The Coulomb blockade excludes a direct contribution of the complexes to a surface photoconductivity. Moreover, a significant negative photoconductivity of the two-dimensional holes is observed at high excitation levels, presumably as a result of the quantum scattering of the two-dimensional holes by the complexes. A shell model of surface multi-exciton complexes is introduced.     

Photoluminescence study of the annihilation process of donor-bound excitons in ZnO： observation of quantum mechanical interference

We report a photoluminescence observation of the coupling of donor-bound excitons and longitudinal optical phonons in high-quality ZnO crystals at 5 K. The first-order phonon Stockes line of donor-bound excitons exhibits a distinct asymmetric line shape with a clear dip at its higher energy side, suggesting that quantum mechanical interference occurs during the annihilation of donor-bound excitons. The donor binding energy is determined to be 49.3 meV from spectral featural.     

Charged excitons in quantum dots: novel magnetic behavior and Auger processes

We describe theoretically multiply-charged excitons interacting with a continuum of delocalized states. Such excitons exist in relatively shallow quantum dots and have been observed in recent optical experiments on InAs self-assembled dots. The interaction of an exciton and delocalized states occurs via Auger-like processes. To describe the optical spectra, we employ the Anderson-like Hamiltonian by including the interaction between the localized exciton and delocalized states of the wetting layer. In the absence of a magnetic field, the photoluminescence line shapes exhibit interference effects. When a magnetic field is applied, the photoluminescence spectrum demonstrates anticrossings with the Landau levels of the extended states. We show that the magnetic-field behavior of charged excitons is very different to that of diamagnetic excitons in three and two-dimensional systems.     

Circular photogalvanic effect at inter-band excitation in semiconductor quantum wells

We observed a circular photogalvanic effect (CPGE) in GaAs quantum wells at inter-band excitation. The spectral dependence of the CPGE is measured together with that of the polarization degree of the time-resolved photoluminescence. A theoretical model takes into account spin splitting of conduction and valence bands.     

Control of spin state in CdSe quantum dots by coupling with magnetic semiconductor quantum dots

We studied spin states of CdSe quantum dots (QDs) coupled with CdMnSe QDs by probing circular polarization of photoluminescence spectrum under external magnetic fields. The bandgap energies of CdSe and CdMnSe QDs are close to each other and photoluminescence mainly originates from CdSe QDs due to relatively low radiation efficiency of CdMnSe QDs. The photoluminescence lifetime as well as its intensity was decreased with increasing magnetic field, which was ascribed to the increase in the ground state wavefunctions in CdMnSe QDs. The decrease was more pronounced for spin down electrons, which was explained by the difference in spin up and down wave functions under magnetic fields. Our results show that the spin state of CdSe QDs can be manipulated by coupling with CdMnSe QDs.     

Interfacial Ferromagnetism in a Co/CdTe Ferromagnet/Semiconductor Quantum Well Hybrid Structure

The magnetization properties of a ferromagnet-semiconductor Co/CdMgTe/CdTe quantum well hybrid structure are investigated by several techniques. Exploiting the proximity effect between acceptor bound holes and magnetic ions we detect the magnetization curves by measuring the circular polarization of photoluminescence in an out-of-plane magnetic field. We show that magnetization originates from interfacial ferromagnet on Co-CdMgTe interface and the proximity effect is caused by magnetization of interfacial Co-CdMgTe ferromagnetic layer whose magnetic properties are very different from Co.