Exciton-electron interaction in quantum wells with a two dimensional electron gas of low density

II–VI quantum-well structures containing a 2DEG of low density have been investigated by means of polarized photoluminescence, photoluminescence excitation and reflectivity in external magnetic fields up to 20 T. The spin splittings of the exciton X and the negatively charged exciton X ⁻ are measured as a function of the magnetic field strength. The behavior of the magnetic-field-induced polarization degree of the luminescence line related to X ⁻ demonstrates the formation process of negatively charged excitons from excitons and free carriers polarized by the external magnetic field. We have determined the binding energies of the trion formed either with the heavy-hole or the light-hole exciton. The optically detected magnetic resonance (ODMR) technique was applied for the first time to study the optical transition processes in a nanosecond timescale. The electron ODMR was observed with the detection on either the direct exciton or the negatively charged exciton X. Further evidence for the interaction of excitons with the electrons of the two-dimensional gas are demonstrated by a combined exciton-cyclotron resonance line observed in reflectivity and luminescence excitation, shake-up processes observed in photoluminescence, as well as inelastic and spin-dependent scattering processes. Fiz. Tverd. Tela (St. Petersburg) 41, 831–836 (May 1999) Published in English in the original Russian journal. Reproduced here with stylistic changes by the Translation Editor.     

Ab initio calculations of the deformation potentials for intervalley phonon-assisted transitions in АIIIВV crystals with sphalerite structure

Completely self-consistent ab initio calculations of scattering of electrons between the lowest minima of the conduction band by short-wavelength phonons are performed for the first time for a group of А ^III В ^V semiconductor crystals. The structure constants, electron and vibrational spectra, and probabilities of scattering are calculated for the crystals from unified positions within the electronic density functional method. The theory does not involve any phenomenological assumptions on positions of minima in the conduction band, effective carrier masses, interatomic forces, or scattering probabilities. The electron-phonon coupling constants (the deformation potentials) for actual Γ−X, Γ−L, and X−L transitions for scattering between the nonequivalent X−X and L−L valleys in the conduction bands of AlP, AlAs, AlSb, GaP, GaAs, GaSb, InP, InAs, and InSb crystals with sphalerite structure are calculated. Results obtained are compared with theoretical calculations within the phenomenological rigid ion model and with those performed by the selfconsistent frozen phonon method.     

Temperature-induced delocalization of excitations in GaAs/AlAs type-II superlattices

This paper describes investigations of the photoluminescence spectra of heterostructures containing short-period type-II GaAs/AlAs superlattices grown both within the regime where the heterojunction is smoothed, and in a regime where it is not smoothed, in the temperature range 10–40 K. A quantitative analysis of the experimental data shows that the quenching of exciton luninescence in the majority of cases is characterized by a single value of the activation energy E ₂=8±1 meV which coincides with the value of the binding energy of an X-Γ exciton. It is concluded that the primary reason for quenching in this temperature interval is thermal dissociation of the exciton into a pair of free carriers whose delocalization is accompanied by nonradiative recombination at traps. It is observed that smoothing the heterojunction leads to an increase in the probability of quenching by 1–2 orders of magnitude on the average. Fiz. Tverd. Tela (St. Petersburg) 40, 1140–1146 (June 1998)     

Differential magnetoreflection spectroscopy of doped and undoped II–VI semiconductor quantum wells

A method has been developed for recording and analyzing the differential magnetoreflection (magnetotransmission) spectra of semiconductor structures with quantum wells. The method was used to determine the exciton g-factor in semimagnetic CdTe/(Cd, Mn)Te heterostructures with quantum wells. In nonmagnetic structures with quantum wells containing a two-dimensional electron gas, the excitonic damping depends on the spin state of the exciton. This effect is explained by the exchange contribution to exciton-electron scattering. Pis’ma Zh. éksp. Teor. Fiz. 65, No. 1, 44–49 (10 January 1997)     

Frequency and density dependent radiative recombination processes in III–V semiconductor quantum wells and superlattices

In this paper we review the radiative recombination processes occurring in semiconductor quantum wells and superlattices under different excitation conditions. We consider processes whose radiative efficiency depends on the photogenerated density of elementary excitations and on the frequency of the exciting field, including luminescence induced by multiphoton absorption, exciton and biexciton radiative decay, luminescence arising from inelastic excitonic scattering, and electron-hole plasma recombination.

Semiconductor quantum wells are ideal systems for the investigation of radiative recombination processes at different carrier densities owing to the peculiar wavefunction confinement which enhances the optical non-linearities and the bistable behaviour of the crystal. Radiative recombination processes induced by multi-photon absorption processes can be studied by exciting the crystal in the transparency region under an intense photon flux. The application of this non-linear spectroscopy gives direct access to the excited excitonic states in the quantum wells owing to the symmetry properties and the selection rules for artificially layered semiconductor heterostructures.

Different radiative recombination processes can be selectively tuned at exciting photon energies resonant with real states or in the continuum of the conduction band depending on the actual density of photogenerated carriers. We define three density regimes in which different quasi-particles are responsible for the dominant radiative recombination mechanisms of the crystal: (i) The dilute boson gas regime, in which exciton density is lower than 10¹⁰ cm^-2. Under this condition the decay of free and bound excitons is the main radiative recombination channel in the crystal. (ii) The intermediate density range (n < 10¹¹ cm^-2) at which excitonic molecules (biexcitons) and inelastic excitonic scattering processes contribute with additional decay mechanisms to the characteristic luminescence spectra. (iii) The high density range (n ?10¹² cm^-2) where screening of the Coulomb interaction leads to exciton ionization. The optical transitions hence originate from the radiative decay of free-carriers in a dense electron-hole plasma.

The fundamental theoretical and experimental aspects of the radiative recombination processes are discussed with special attention to the GaAs/Al _x Ga_1-x As and Ga _x In_1-x As/Al _y In_1-y As materials systems. The experimental investigations of these effects are performed in the limit of intense exciting fields by tuning the density of photogenerated quasi-particles and the frequency of the exciting photons. Under these conditions the optical response of the quantum well strongly deviates from the well-known linear excitonic behaviour. The optical properties of the crystal are then no longer controlled by the transverse dielectric constant or by the first-order dielectric susceptibility. They are strongly affected by many-body interactions between the different species of photogenerated quasi-particles, resulting in dramatic changes of the emission properties of the semiconductor.

The systematic investigation of these radiative recombination processes allows us to selectively monitor the many-body induced changes in the linear and non-linear optical transitions involving quantized states of the quantum wells. The importance of these effects, belonging to the physics of highly excited semiconductors, lies in the possibility of achieving population inversion of states associated with different radiative recombination channels and strong optical non-linearities causing laser action and bistable behaviour of two-dimensional heterostructures, respectively.     

Nuclear DVCS at small <Emphasis Type="Italic">x</Emphasis> using color-dipole phenomenology

Using the high-energy color-dipole formalism, we study the coherent and incoherent nuclear DVCS process, γ ^* A→γ  X, in the small-x regime. We consider simple models for the elementary dipole–hadron scattering amplitude that capture the main features of the dependence on atomic number A, on energy and on momentum transfer t. Using the amplitudes obtained we make predictions for the nuclear DVCS cross section at the photon level in collider kinematics.     

Free carrier absorption in quantizing magnetic fields: Nonpolar optical phonon scattering

A quantum theory of free carrier absorption in nondegenerate semiconductors and in strong magnetic fields which was previously developed to treat the case when acoustic phonon scattering dominates the free carrier absorption process [1] is extended to treat the case when nonpolar optical scattering is important. When the electromagnetic radiation field is polarized parallel to the direction of the applied magnetic field, results are obtained which are similar to those when acoustic phonon scattering is dominant. The free carrier absorption is an oscillatory function of the magnetic field which on the average increases in magnitude with the magnetic field. However, more structure in the free carrier absorption occurs when nonpolar optical phonon scattering dominates. This is due to the fact that there are two periods in the oscillatory magnetic field dependence associated with the emission or the absorption of optical phonons during the intraband transitions. When the cyclotron frequency exceeds the sum of the photon and optical phonon frequencies, i.e. ω_c > θ + ω_o, the free carrier absorption is predicted to increase linearly with magnetic field when ?ω_c? k_BT. The magnetic field dependence of the free carrier absorption can be explained in terms of phonon-assisted transitions between the various Landau levels in a band involving the emission and absorption of optical phonons.     

Stimulated photoluminescence of ZnSe

The stimulated emission from ZnSe under one photon or two photon excitation has been investigated in the temperature range between 20 and 100 K. The spectra obtained under quasi-resonant one photon pumping show a dominant P line, ascribed to exciton-exciton scattering on the basis of its intensity dependence and its optical gain spectrum. The role of many-body processes under non-resonant one photon excitation is discussed. Under two photon pumping the LO-phonon assisted free exciton recombination is shown to be the dominant lasing mechanism.     

Electronic transmission through a ladder with a single side-attached impurity

We study the electronic transmission of a model system composed by two coupled chains with an impurity attached to one of them. Analytical espressions for the transmittivity and for the diagonal and the off-diagonal Green’s function matrix elements are derived. Green’s function behaviour as function of the charge carrier energy is exploited to interpret the system transmittivity calculated by the scattering matrix formalism. We find that while a single substitutional impurity in the ladder may generate a Fano resonance in the transmittivity in the lower or in the higher energy part of the spectrum, in the case of a single side-attached impurity to the ladder, a resonance is found in each energy region. We interpret such resonances in terms of local density of states and off-diagonal Green’s function matrix elements.     

Quantum optical effects in semiconductor microcavities

Investigations of quantum effects in semiconductor quantum-well microcavities interacting with laser light in the strong-coupling regime are presented. Modifications of quantum fluctuations of the outgoing light are expected due to the non-linearity originating from coherent exciton–exciton scattering. In the strong-coupling regime, this scattering translates into a four-wave mixing interaction between the mixed exciton–photon states, the polaritons. Squeezing and giant amplification of the polariton field and of the outgoing light field fluctuations are predicted. However, polariton–phonon scattering is shown to yield excess noise in the output field, which may destroy the non-classical effects. Experiments demonstrate evidence for giant amplification due to coherent four-wave mixing of polaritons. Noise reduction below the thermal noise level was also observed. To cite this article: E. Giacobino et al., C. R. Physique 3 (2002) 41–52     

Higher-order amplitude squeezing of photons propagating through a semiconductor

Kth power photon amplitude squeezing is studied when the coherent photon propagates through a semiconductor containing the exciton. If the exciton is prepared initially in a coherent state, the photon may become Kth power amplitude squeezed. It is shown that, in the short-time limit, the photon squeezing in the P direction does not appear at all while that in the X direction is possible for all the amplitude powers K. In the latter case, the amount of squeezing is larger for higher power K. The dependences on all the system parameters as well as on the output light detection moment are investigated in detail.     

Studies on the vibrational excitation differential cross sections of non-resonant e-N2 scattering using augmented polarization potentials

Distributed spherical Gaussian (DSG) correlation-polarization model potentials with higher-order terms and exact exchange effects in single-configuration Slater determinant are taken into account for low-energy vibrational excitation e-N₂ scattering system. The integrodifferential coupled channel equations are solved using a combination of linear-algebraic and R-matrix-propagator algorithms. Analytic Born completion is used to calculate high-order scattering matrix elements in order to obtain convergent differential cross sections. The energy range is set to 4–15 eV which is not tested by the present theoretical method before. The overall agreement of theoretical results with the latest experiments emphasizes the importance of higher-order correlation-polarization potentials and rigorous exchange effects in vibrational excitation scattering.     

Indirect exciton absorption and Raman scattering in GaAs-AlGaAs superlattices

Longitudinal optic (LO) phonon assisted indirect exciton creation (X_LO), hot carrier relaxation ((e-h)_LO) and Raman scattering phenomena are reported in the optical spectra of GaAs-AlGaAs superlattices. Structures of the same dimensions both with and without double heterostructure confining barriers are studied. For the structures without confining barriers, continuum transitions are suppressed in photoluminescence excitation (PLE) spectra, and as a result the X_LO, (e-h)_LO and Raman peaks are observed. The X_LO absorption peaks are identified from the observation of a clear threshold in PLE at ℏω_LO (36.4 meV) above the heavy hole exciton peak. The intensity of X_LO is a maximum at 6 meV above the threshold, probably due to dissociation into free carriers at the exciton binding energy (6meV) above ℏω_LO. The influence of non-radiative processes on incoherent (PLE) and coherent (Raman) processes is compared.     

Gauge invariance, infrared/collinear singularitiesand tree level matrix element for e^ + e^- \to \nu_e \bar{\nu}_e \gamma \gamma

One of the necessary steps in constructing a high-precision option of KKMC, a Monte Carlo program for the high-precision simulation of fermion pair production at LEP and Linear Collider energies, was to make a careful study of the appropriate matrix elements calculated from QED and the complete standard model. In particular, the installation of the double bremsstrahlung matrix element for the process into the scheme of coherent exclusive exponentiation (CEEX) was necessary. In the CEEX scheme one has to define an extrapolation and/or reduction procedure to enable the use of the matrix elements for kinematical configurations with a large number of outgoing particles. The process under study is particularly interesting because of the gauge cancellation of contributions for photon emission from incoming fermion lines and t-channel W. The QED U(1) gauge properties require terms of the triple and quartic gauge couplings to be taken into consideration as well. A natural separation of the complete amplitude into gauge invariant parts was found and is among the main results of the paper. Each part has a well defined physical interpretation, which after partial integration over phase space provides infrared singular, leading-log, next-to-leading-log, and other terms. Contributions related to the triple and quartic gauge coupling of W (extracted with the help of an expansion around the contact W-interaction) have been ordered as well. The separation can be of broader interest; it originates from the rigorous calculation of matrix elements; it visualizes, in the language of spin amplitudes, the properties of factorization necessary for the common multi-process picture. For example, the multiple photon algorithm of PHOTOS, based on the parton shower-like approach, profits from similar considerations. These somewhat speculative aspects of the calculation will be mentioned in the paper as well. Received: 24 April 2005, Revised: 22 July 2005, Published online: 11 October 2005 Supported in part by the EU grant MTKD-CT-2004-510126, in patnership with the CERN Physics department, and Polish State Committee for Scientific Research (KBN) grant 2 P03B 091 27 for years 2004-2006.     

Photoluminescence asymmetry with quantum state preparation

We show that the number of photons in a strongly coupled exciton–photon system is asymmetric with the detuning of the modes when, in the spontaneous emission regime, the two modes are entangled. As changing the detuning is easy in semiconductor microcavities–where on the other hand the nature of the strong-coupling in terms of single-particle effects is not yet resolved–we propose this effect as a test of the quantum character of microcavity polaritons.     

Raman spectroscopy of resonance exciton tunneling in GaAs/AlAs superlattices in electric fields

Optical-resonance-Raman scattering by acoustic phonons is used to study the effect of an electric field on the state of excitons in GaAs/AlAs superlattices. When the energy of the exciting photon coincides with the energy of an exciton bound to Wannier-Stark states of a heavy hole and electron with Δn=0,±1, the acoustic Raman scattering is enhanced. Oscillations in the intensity of the Raman spectrum in the electric field are explained by resonance delocalization of the exciton ground state as it interacts with Wannier-Stark states of neighboring quantum wells or with Wannier-Stark states of a higher electron miniband. Fiz. Tverd. Tela (St. Petersburg) 40, 827–829 (May 1998)     

Photoluminescence and multiphonon resonant Raman scattering in Ni-and Co-doped Zn1−x MnxTe crystals

Low-temperature photoluminescence, exciton reflection, and multiphonon resonant Raman scattering spectra of Ni-and Co-doped Zn_1−x Mn_xTe crystals were investigated. Intense emission occurs in a broad spectral region (1100–17 000 cm⁻¹) in the crystals containing Ni atoms. It is caused by intracenter transitions involving Mn²⁺ ions and transitions between the conduction band and a level of the doubly charged acceptor. The features of the exciton photoluminescence and multiphonon resonant Raman scattering involving longitudinal-optical (LO) phonons at various temperatures are investigated. The insignificant efficiency of the localization of excitons on potential fluctuations in the Zn_1−x Mn_xTe:Co crystals is established. A temperature-induced increase in the intensity of the 5LO multiphonon resonant Raman scattering line due to the approach of the conditions for resonance between this line and the ground exciton state is observed in these crystals. Fiz. Tverd. Tela (St. Petersburg) 40, 616–621 (April 1998)     

Effective-range expansion for two coupled channels and properties of bound states

The S matrix and the scattering-amplitude matrix (F matrix) are considered for the case of two coupled elastic-scattering channels differing by the values of the orbital angular momentum (l ₁ and l ₂ = l ₁ + 2). The matrix elements of the S and F matrices in the absence of Coulomb interaction are expressed in terms of the matrix elements of the matrix K ⁻¹ inverse to the reaction K matrix. The elements of the K ⁻¹ matrix are written in the form of expansions that are generalizations of the single-channel effective-range expansion. If there is a bound state in the system of colliding particles, then an analytic continuation of these expansions to the region of negative energies makes it possible to obtain both the position of the pole corresponding to this bound state and the residues of scattering amplitudes at this pole, the respective vertex constants and asymptotic normalization coefficients being expressed in terms of these residues. By way of example, the developed formalism is applied to describing triplet neutron-proton scattering.     

Optical spectroscopy of a single InAs/GaAs quantum dot in high magnetic fields

We report on the measurements of the photoluminescence from the s-shell of a single InAs/GaAs quantum dot in magnetic fields up to 23 T. The observed multiline emission is attributed to different charge states of a single dot. Characteristic anticrossing of emission lines is explained in terms of hybridization of final states of a triply charged exciton (X⁻³).