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Applied Physics Letters

Possibility of optical bistability due to resonant intersubband excitation in stepped modulation-doped quantum wells

D.J. Newson, A. Kurobe

Published Nov 23, 1987• 21 citations
Publisher

Abstract

We propose the use of a novel doped, stepped semiconductor quantum well structure as an optical nonlinear element. The large nonlinearity results from the change of many-body effects on resonant excitation of electrons from the ground to the first excited subband. Self-consistent calculations showed that the intersubband energy separation can be increased by up to 7 meV on intense illumination, compared to 1 meV for a conventional, square quantum well. We estimate that optical switching at powers below 1 W are feasible in an optimized structure, with switching times of about 1 ps.

DOI
10.1063/1.98538

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Journal of Applied Physics•Mar 15, 1999•13 citations
We propose the use of a novel doped, stepped semiconductor quantum well structure as an optical nonlinear element. The large nonlinearity results from the change of many-body effects on resonant excitation of electrons from the ground to the first excited subband. Self-consistent calculations showed that the intersubband energy separation can be increased by up to 7 meV on intense illumination, compared to 1 meV for a conventional, square quantum well. We estimate that optical switching at powers below 1 W are feasible in an optimized structure, with switching times of about 1 ps.
Modulation-doped system of asymmetric coupled quantum wells is shown theoretically to possess a large optical nonlinearity due to the charge transfer associated with intersubband transition. The range of parameters leading to optical bistability has been determined. A novel triple quantum well system is suggested, allowing a few orders of magnitude reduction in switching power density, to ~50 W/cm2, while having a response time of <100 ps. Optically assisted transfer of up to 90% of all carriers between wells can become an operating principle of novel hybrid optoelectronic devices, incorporating the triple quantum well system into the channel of modulation-doped field-effect transistor with potential applications as fast optoelectronic switches and detectors in the 10-µm range.
A modulation-doped system of asymmetric-coupled quantum wells is shown theoretically to possess a large optical nonlinearity due to the change transfer associated with intersubband transition. The range of parameters leading to optical bistability is detetermined. A novel triple quantum well system is suggested, allowing a few orders of magnitude reduction in switching power density. Novel hybrid optoelectronic devices, incorporating the triple quantum well system into the channel of a modulation-doped field-effect transistor, are proposed with potential applications as optoelectronic switches and detectors.
In the past few years advance in nanofabrication techniques have made it possible to make well-like compound semiconductor structures of low nanometer size.In these structures,the state of the electron in the direction perpendicular to the length of the well is quantized with sufficiently large separation in energy levels and the motion of the electron parallel to the length is that of a quasi-free electron.One of the most remarkable properties of these one-dimensional electron system is that the optical transitions between the size-quantized subbands are feasible.The result shows there is a large optical nonlinearities in asymmetric quantum wells.The problem of optical saturation of intersubband absorption has recently attracted considerable attention.The problem is very important to the development of superlattice devices such as fast infrared detectors and(modulators) because one needs to know the range of input optical intensities for which linear operation is(possible.) The analytical expression of the linear and the third-order nonlinear optical intersubband absorption coefficients are obtained in Pschl-Teller wells using the density matrix formalism taking into account the(intrasubband) relaxation.Since there are two adjustable parameters κ and λ in Pschl-Teller wells,the shapes of the wells will change with the change of the parameters κ and λ,accordingly the linear and the third-order nonlinear optical absorption coefficients will change with the parameters κ and λ.It is shown that the optical absorption coefficient depends on the parameter,and the optical intensity strongly. The absorption saturation will occur with I increase.Numerical results are presented for a typical AlGaAs/GaAs Pschl-Teller well.
Some interesting features of the intrinsic optical bistability, based on intersubband transitions in asymmetric semiconductor quantum wells, are analyzed within the two-level model. In particular, the excitation-induced levels shifting, on which the bistability relies, is found to be significantly influenced by the exchange-correlation potential, thus requiring self-consistent modeling-the simple charge separation dipole model is not accurate enough. The optical influence of the permanent dipole moment, characterizing bound states in asymmetric quantum wells, is also analyzed. This is found to have some beneficial and some adverse consequences on bistability, both of which may be quite important in realistic structures.>
We analyze the optical modulation of an interband resonant light pulse by intersubband resonant light pulses in a three-level quantum well system. The origin of the third order self-saturation optical nonlinearity resulting in the modification of the interband light absorption is assumed to lie in the carrier density modulation induced by the interband and intersubband transitions. The optical nonlinearity can be optimized to achieve the maximum modulation by applying control light pulses shorter than the intersubband energy relaxation time but longer than the intersubband phase relaxation time. We have also experimentally investigated the material system suitable for optical communication regime and have observed that the In0.53Ga0.47As/AlAs0.56Sb0.44 quantum well lattice matched to InP yielding an intersubband transition as short as 1.4 μm is the most suitable system for the proposed modulation scheme.