We discuss the excitable behavior of excitons and biexcitons in a nonlinear optical ring cavity. The nonlinearity is due to the process of the creation of biexcitons by photon-assisted conversion of excitons. In the bifurcation analysis a region where a saddle point is close to an equilibrium has been found. In this region the system shows excitability. It is shown that the mechanism of the excitable behavior of excitons and biexcitons in a ring cavity is different from that of two-level atoms in the same system. The possible applications of an excitable ring cavity are discussed.
We discuss the excitable behavior of excitons and biexcitons in a nonlinear optical ring cavity. The nonlinearity is due to the process of the creation of biexcitons by photon-assisted conversion of excitons. In the bifurcation analysis a region where a saddle point is close to an equilibrium has been found. In this region the system shows excitability. It is shown that the mechanism of the excitable behavior of excitons and biexcitons in a ring cavity is different from that of two-level atoms in the same system. The possible applications of an excitable ring cavity are discussed.
A system of nonlinear differential equations describing the dynamic evolution of coherent excitons, photons, and biexcitons is derived in the geometry of a ring cavity. Nonlinearity is caused by the direct binding of two excitons in a biexciton as a result of their Coulomb interaction, which was first predicted by Ivanov, Keldysh, and Panashchenko. The equation of state of the theory of optical bistability is obtained for the stationary case. The stability of stationary states is studied, and the switching times between the branches of the optical bistability curve are determined. It is shown that the appearance of nonlinear periodic and chaotic self-pulsations with the creation of a system of limit cycles and strange attractors in phase space is possible in the unstable portions of the equation of state. Dynamic optical bistability is studied, and the possibility of experimentally detecting the phenomena studied is discussed.
We study a new class of nonlinear cooperative phenomena that occur when light propagates in direct-gap semiconductors. The nonlinearity here is due to a process, first discussed by A. L. Ivanov, L. V. Keldysh, and V. V. Panashchenko, in which two excitons are bound into a biexciton by virtue of their Coulomb interaction. For the geometry of a ring cavity, we derive a system of nonlinear differential equations describing the dynamical evolution of coherent excitons, photons, and biexcitons. For the time-independent case we arrive at the equation of state of optical bistability theory, and this equation is found to differ considerably from the equations of state in the two-level atom model and in the exciton region of the spectrum. We examine the stability of the steady states and determine the switchover times between the optical bistability branches. We also show that in the unstable sections of the equation of state, nonlinear periodic and chaotic self-pulsations may arise, with limit cycles and strange attractors being created in the phase space of the system. The scenario for the transition to the dynamical chaos mode is found. A computer experiment is used to study the dynamic optical bistability. Finally, we discuss the possibility of detecting these phenomena in experiments.
Nonlinear optical response of cavity polaritons formed in high-g semiconductor microcavities has attracted much attention because of their potential applications to entangled-photon sources and other quantum information technologies. Theoretical ideas of entangled-photon generation, e.g., biexcitonic cavity quantum electrodynamics and polariton-polariton scattering, have been suggested, however these theories are limited in scope of target because they restrict two-exciton states to either biexciton or unbound two-exciton states. As for exciton system with small binding energy of biexciton, it is likely that the interplay between the biexciton and unbound two-exciton states have much impact on generation efficiency of entangled photons. The authors introduces a general model including both biexciton and unbound two-exciton states and discuss generation efficiency of entangled photons.
Turbulence and chaos in a semiconductor crystal? These are just some of the intriguing predictions of nonlinear optics with coherent excitons. In this chapter we discuss some aspects of nonlinear coherent optics with the participation of the excitons, photons, and biexcitons. As in many nonlinear systems, these effects arise because of feedback mechanisms, i.e., the light impinging on the system affects the electronic states, which in turn affect the dielectric constant of the medium through which the light passes. These effects are closely related to the phenomena of self-organization [1-8] and optical bistability [7-10] and self-pulsations and the appearance of chaos [2-6]. The cooperative nonlinear coherent processes in optical systems have recently attracted much attention [7-20]. These investigations have stimulated the development of new mathematical methods [21-31] and have opened up possibilities for many new applications. The theoretical and the experimental investigations in these directions give rise to the theory of solitons [32∧2] and lead to the new developments in the optics of ultrashort pulses [43-58]. Ultrafast phenomena such as self-induced transparency and nutation are related to the propagation of solitons and pulse trains, whereas the transient stages of the ultrashort lightpulse penetration in the media are described by area theorems. These coherent ultrafast phenomena typically take place during intervals of time less than the relaxation time, i.e., femtoseconds to picoseconds in typical solids. Collisions and incoherent scattering processes destroy the coherent evolution of the excited particles. But if coherent macroscopic states of the excitons, photons, and biexcitons have been formed because of spontaneous or induced BEC, in this case one can consider their time evolution over intervals of time much greater than the relaxation time.
Great progress has been made in recent years in experimental studies of excitonic molecules, both in direct-band and indirect-band semiconductors. The exciton systems in these semiconductors differ substantially. In direct-band semiconductors with dipole-allowed optical transitions, the direct-recombination times are extremely small. Consequently the processes of binding of excitons into excitonic molecules and their decay occur under strongly nonequilibrium conditions. Hence one can obtain the fundamental information on biexcitons in these semiconductors by nonlinear optical methods. This review discusses the processes on which the various methods are based: two-photon resonance excitation of biexcitons, induced one-photon conversion of an exciton into a biexciton, two-photon resonance Raman scattering involving biexciton states, etc., and their application to studying biexcitons with the example of CdS. Problems of bistability involving biexcitons are also briefly discussed. In indirect semiconductors, where recombination occurs with the emission of a phonon, the lifetimes of excitons are large, and quasiequilibrium can be established in the exciton system. Under these conditions the information on the properties of the molecules is obtained by analyzing their radiative-decay spectra. The problem of detecting biexcitons in indirect semiconductors, radiative decay of molecules, and the effect on their stability of external electric, strain, and magnetic fields are discussed in detail with the examples of Si and Ge. Also the results of investigating the quantum statistical behavior of a dense gas of spin-oriented excitons (in a magnetic field under conditions in which the biexcitons are destabilized) are briefly presented (using the example of uniaxially compressed germanium), and the question of the possibility of their Bose condensation is discussed.