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Physical Review Letters

Coherent Control of Light Absorption and Carrier Dynamics in Semiconductor Nanostructures

W. Pötz

Published Oct 27, 1997• 50 citations
Publisher

Abstract

It is shown theoretically that light absorption in semiconductor nanostructures can be manipulated by coherent microwave fields. In suitably designed double wells, amplitude and phase of a microwave field allow control of both light absorption and the dynamics, i.e., tunneling versus localization of electrons. Depending on the photon energy of the pump pulse, either enhancement or reduction of net absorption can be achieved.

DOI
10.1103/physrevlett.79.3262

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It is shown theoretically that light absorption in semiconductor nanostructures can be manipulated by coherent microwave fields. In suitably designed double wells, amplitude and phase of a microwave field allow control of both light absorption and the dynamics, i.e., tunneling versus localization of electrons. Depending on the photon energy of the pump pulse, either enhancement or reduction of net absorption can be achieved.
We present two examples of coherent control of inter(sub)band transitions in a semiconductor double well by coherent light sources. Accounting for the upper hole subband and two lowest electron subbands, a microscopic theoretical analysis shows that electron‐hole pair generation by a sub‐picosecond pump pulse can be controlled by the intensity and the phase of a dc microwave field which resonantly couples the two electron subbands. Light absorption can be either enhanced or reduced. Secondly, it is shown that proper combination of two pulsed laser fields allows control of electron inter(sub)band transitions and final‐state population, i.e., the formation of indirect versus direct excitons.
We investigate theoretically coherent control of optical absorption and emission (optical gain) in semiconductor double wells by use of two coherent light sources. Our analysis is based on a microscopic theory of optical excitation in semiconductors which accounts for many-body effects. Specifically, we show that electron–hole pair (exciton) formation in an asymmetric double well can be controlled by intensity and phase of a dc microwave (MW) field if the pulse duration lies below the MW-induced Rabi period. Similarly, resonant MW fields are shown to allow control of intersubband absorption and emission spectra of semiconductor heterostructures.
Schemes for coherent control of carrier dynamics in semiconductors are investigated theoretically. We consider coherent control of carrier generation and charge oscillations by quantum interference of one- and three-photon absorption, as well as one- and two-photon absorption. It is shown that, for coherent light pulses shorter than characteristic phase breaking times, the relative phase between the two excitation routes can be used to control the extent of charge oscillations in semiconductor double wells. Furthermore, we show that optical gain and absorption can be controlled coherently by two coherent light fields. In particular, optical gain can be shifted from one intersubband transition to another.
Structural coherent control is used to design open semiconductor heterostructures whose intersubband absorption displays either single-slit or double-slit quantum interference. In this theoretical study we show that in the ``double-slit'' structure, optical intersubband absorption of a light pulse can be modified by adjustment of the phase of a control field. By careful choice of the steady-state subband population via charge transport through the heterostructure, an incident pump pulse can either be amplified or attenuated. This coherent control mechanism is absent in the ``single-slit'' structure. Our results and physical interpretation are based on a microscopic self-consistent semiclassical theory of the light-matter interaction in semiconductors and the use of a gauge which allows direct physical interpretation of the electron kinetic equations.
The feasibility of achieving coherent control of tunnelling dynamics, associated with electronic excitations in functionalized semiconductor nanostructures, is investigated. The coherent control scenario is based on the application of frequent stochastic unitary pulses, affecting the interference phenomena between electronic wave-packet components and consequently the overall electronic tunnelling dynamics without collapsing the coherent quantum evolution of the system. It is shown that tunnelling can be inhibited and eventually halted by sufficiently frequent pulse fields that exchange energy with the system but do not affect the potential energy tunnelling barriers. Further, the proposed stochastic quantum-control scenario is demonstrated more generally as applied to an archetype model, a particle tunnelling in a quartic double-well potential.
We present results for two coherent control schemes in semiconductor heterostructures obtained within Boltzmann- Bloch equations. The latter are obtained from Dyson's equation within the Keldysh nonequilibrium Green's function approach and allow a microscopic analysis of coherent control schemes in semiconductors. Here we focus on the coherent control of optical gain and longitudinal optical photon emission rates in intersubband transitions in a three-subband model of a biased asymmetric double well. We show that by coupling the two energetically close subbands with a coherent microwave field, we can induce coherence into the carriers in the double well, thus manipulating intersubband transitions. By adjusting the phase of the microwave field, we can achieve significant modification to the gain spectra for light pulses shorter than the period of the low frequency intersubband polarization. Similarly, LO- phonon induced intersubband transitions can be controlled due to quantum interference between electron-lattice and electron-light interactions.