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American Journal of Physics

Intrinsic optical bistability in a semiconductor doped glass filter

F. Pereira, José R. Salcedo, Michael Scott Belsley

Published Sep 1, 1995• 2 citations
Publisher

Abstract

We present a simple experiment which demonstrates the main features of intrinsic optical bistability obtained through thermally induced shifts in the band edge of semiconductor particles embedded in a glass matrix. This readily demonstrates how nonlinear optical effects can be used to transmit information, providing an instructive introduction to the main concepts of optical computing. Several possible extensions of the experiment suitable for advanced independent research projects are discussed.

DOI
10.1119/1.17810

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We present a simple experiment which demonstrates the main features of intrinsic optical bistability obtained through thermally induced shifts in the band edge of semiconductor particles embedded in a glass matrix. This readily demonstrates how nonlinear optical effects can be used to transmit information, providing an instructive introduction to the main concepts of optical computing. Several possible extensions of the experiment suitable for advanced independent research projects are discussed.
Wherret et al.1 have derived a general condition for the existence of intrinsic optical bistability, stipulating that the absorption length of the sample, αL, must be less than 0.18. Nonetheless several research groups have observed optical bistability in samples with absorption lengths significantly above this limit.2 It has been suggested2 that the observed bistability is the result of an initial self-focusing of the incident beam brought about by thermal refractive index change which then induces a bistable effect in the final portion of the sample. If the focal length of the laser induced thermal lens is comparable with the sample thickness, then the reduction of the laser beam size could then induce bistability at a lower threshold in the final portion of the sample. We have carried a systematic test of this hypothesis, using a modified version of the Z-scan technique, on a commercially available semiconductor-doped glass filter.
We have characterized the transverse spatial dependence of the real and imaginary parts of the complex nonlinear refractive index of a semiconductor doped glass filter, which exhibits absorptive bistability. Using the Z-scan technique, combined with an interferometric measurement of the integrated optical thickness, we are able to fit the observed experimental data assuming a quadratically varying transverse temperature profile in the sample. The transverse variations in the nonlinear refractive index do not scale directly with the size of the incident beam, but exhibit marked asymmetries depending on whether the incident beam is converging or diverging.
Nonlinear optical properties of laser-excited semiconductors are discussed, and the applications to optical bistability and optical logic are reviewed. The physical origin of the nonlinearities is analyzed in terms of the many-body interactions in the system of electron-hole pairs, causing effects such as plasma screening of the Coulomb interaction, band-gap renormalization, and band filling. Theoretical results for absorption and refractive-index spectra are compared to experimental data obtained for room-temperature GaAs and other semiconductors. The experimental and theoretical results for dispersive optical bistability in semiconductors are summarized, and recent experiments on optical logic gating and pattern recognition are discussed.
Intrinsic optical bistable devices have the potential for very fast all-optical logic.1 Achievement of high speeds necessitates short devices. Semiconductors are attractive materials for providing the essential optical nonlinearity because they can have absorption coefficients of order (μm)-1, ensuring strong interactions in short lengths. Furthermore, they have relatively sharp absorption features, e.g., an exciton, biexciton, or band-edge resonance, which permits very large nonlinear phase shifts via near-resonance enhancement but with low absorption by off-resonance operation.