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Physical Review Letters

Ultrafast All Optical Switching via Tunable Fano Interference

Jin-Hui Wu, Jin-Yue Gao, Ji-Hua Xu, Leonardo Silvestri, M. Artoni, Giuseppe Carlo La Rocca, F. Bassani

Published Jul 25, 2005• 245 citations
Publisher

Abstract

Tunneling induced quantum interference experienced by an incident probe in asymmetric double quantum wells can easily be modulated by means of an external control light beam. This phenomenon, which is here examined within the dressed-state picture, can be exploited to devise a novel all-optical ultrafast switch. For a suitably designed semiconductor heterostructure, the switch is found to exhibit frequency bandwidths of the order of 0.1 THz and response and recovery times of about 1 ps.

DOI
10.1103/physrevlett.95.057401

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Tunneling induced quantum interference experienced by an incident probe in asymmetric double quantum wells can easily be modulated by means of an external control light beam. This phenomenon, which is here examined within the dressed-state picture, can be exploited to devise a novel all-optical ultrafast switch. For a suitably designed semiconductor heterostructure, the switch is found to exhibit frequency bandwidths of the order of 0.1 THz and response and recovery times of about 1 ps.
We study the temporal and spatial dynamics of two light pulses, a probe and a switch, propagating through an asymmetric double quantum well where tunneling-induced quantum interference may be observed. When such an interference takes place, in the absence of the switch, the quantum well is transparent to the probe which propagates over sufficiently long distances at very small group velocities. In the presence of a relatively strong switch, however, the probe pulse is absorbed due to the quenching of tunneling-induced quantum interference. The probe may be made to vanish even when switch and probe are somewhat delayed with respect to one another. Conversely, our asymmetric double quantum well may be rendered either opaque or transparent to the switch pulse. Such a probe-switch ``reciprocity'' can be used to devise a versatile all-optical quantum interference-based solid-state switch for optical communication devices.
Abstract In this communication, we investigate linear and nonlinear (Kerr) responses in an asymmetric double quantum wells induced by a weak probe and controlled by a signal field under double Λ excitation via the Fano interference. By carefully tuning the control field intensities, probe detuning and relative phase of the interacting electromagnetic fields, the amplification as well as the electromagnetically induced transparency (EIT) can be achieved to an efficient level in the proposed scheme. We observe that the absorption of the probe and signal fields decrease with the decrease in the strength of the Fano interference (ξ), while the Kerr nonlinearity enhances by almost ten times, reaching a value of the order ~ 10 − 10 m 2 / V 2 under the regime of EIT. The results presented may serve as a valuable reference for designing optimized slow and fast-light, solid-based optical switching devices, offering significant advantages over those based on atomic media.
Abstract We theoretically investigate the hybrid absorptive-dispersive optical bistability (OB) and optical multistability (OM) behaviors induced by Fano-type interference in a four-subband asymmetric semiconductor double quantum wells scheme driven by a degenerate probe field and a coherent coupling field. We show that the appearance or disappearance of OB can be controlled by modulating the strength of the Fano-type interference. We also present the threshold and hysteresis cycle of the OB can be controlled by adjusting the intensity of the coherent coupling field. Moreover, OB can be switched to OM by tuning the frequency detuning of the coherent coupling field or vice versa. This interesting scheme may provide guidance for technological applications in optoelectronics and solid-state quantum information science.
We investigate the light propagation and dynamical control of a weak pulsed probe field in asymmetric double quantum wells via Fano interference, which is caused by tunneling from the excited subbands to the same continuum. Our results show that the system can produce anomalous and normal dispersion regions with negligible absorption by choosing appropriate coupling strength of the tunneling and the Fano interference. Interesting enough, the dispersion can be switched between normal and anomalous by adjusting the relative phase between the pulsed probe and coherent control fields owing to the existence of the perfectly Fano interference. Thus, the relative phase can be regarded as a switch to manipulate light propagation with subluminal or superluminal. The temporal and spatial dynamics of the pulsed probe field with hyperbolic secant envelope are analyzed.
We study optical bistability (OB) behavior based on intersubband transitions in asymmetric double quantum wells (QWs) where tunneling-induced quantum inference can be observed. The system interacts with a probe-laser field and a control laser field by means of a unidirectional ring cavity. We show that OB can be controlled efficiently by tuning the coupling strength of the tunneling, the Fano-type interference, and the intensity of the control field. The influence of the frequency detuning of the probe and control fields on the electronic OB behavior is also discussed. This investigation can be used for the optimal design of semiconductor QW systems to achieve fast and low-threshold all-optical switches, which is much more practical than that in an atomic system because of its flexible design and the controllable interference strength.
We propose a scheme for obtaining an electromagnetically induced grating in an asymmetric semiconductor quantum well (QW) structure via Fano interference. In our structure, owing to Fano interference, the diffraction intensity of the grating, especially the first-order diffraction, can be significantly enhanced. The diffraction efficiency of the grating can be controlled efficiently by tuning the control field intensity, the interaction length, the coupling strength of tunneling, etc. This investigation may be used to develop novel photonic devices in semiconductor QW systems.