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Homogeneous Linewidth and Dephasing Times of Excitons in CuBr Quantum Dots

P. Gilliot, J. Moniatte, Olivier Crégut, R. Lévy

Published Nov 1, 1997• 4 citations

Abstract

We study CuBr nanocrystals embedded in a borosilicate matrix. The excitonic absorption line is strongly inhomogeneously broadened by the size dispersion of the quantum dots. We explore two ways in order to study the dephasing processes of the transition. The homogeneous absorption linewidth is first determined by spectral hole-burning (SHB) measurements, using a nanosecond dye laser excitation. We then perform degenerate four-wave-mixing experiments (FWM), using 100 fs pulses from a frequency-doubled Ti:sapphire laser. Due to the inhomogeneous broadening, we observe a so-called photon-echo signal and we measure its dynamics. From SHB experiments, we obtain homogeneous linewidths larger than 0.3 meV. From the FWM experiment, we obtain values smaller than 0.2 meV. These discrepancies between SHB and FWM measurements can be explained if we take into account the high excitation intensity necessary to induce absorption saturation in SHB experiments. Moreover, during the 20 ns pulses used, spectral diffusion may occur due to interactions between the nanocrystals and their matrix. Spectrally resolved four-wave-mixing experiments (SR-FWM) are also performed. The oscillations with a 250 fs period we observe at short time delays could be interpreted in terms of quantum beats between two-exciton and one-exciton states.

DOI: 10.1002/1521-396x(199711)164:1<441::aid-pssa441>3.0.co;2-4

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We study the coherence times of CuBr nanocrystals (quantum dots) in a borosilicate matrix under resonant excitation. Measurements are performed in two different experiments: Degenerate four-wave mixing with pulses of approximately 100 fs duration and spectral hole burning using a nanosecond excitation. Our results show a dependence of the dephasing times on the excitation intensity, and, when extrapolated to low intensity, a longer coherence time under fs than ns excitation. This result is tentatively explained as being due to spectral diffusion in the case of ns excitation.

Persistent spectral-holes (p-SH) are burned in the Z1,2 excitonic band of CuBr nanocrystals by a pulsed laser excitation. The annealing of p-SH is studied by three types of hole-filling (HF) experiments: (i) the spontaneous HF, (ii) thermally-induced HF, and (iii) the laser-induced HF. Results are compared to the well developed theory of the persistent spectral hole-burning (p-SHB) in the system of molecules in amorphous matrices. Both p-SHB and HF phenomena can be explained within the framework of a photochemical reaction like the photoionization of nanocrystals. The potential application of p-SHB to the frequency-domain optical data storage is discussed.

Summary form only given. Understanding dephasing in quantum dots, especially dephasing due to electron-phonon interactions, is essential for the use of quantum dots as artificial atoms in applications such as quantum information processing. In this paper, we report experimental studies on dephasing in CdSe/ZnS core/shell nanocrystals using high resolution spectral hole burning. These studies not only allow us to determine the homogeneous linewidth, but also reveal directly discrete acoustic phonon sidebands. The extremely small homogeneous linewidth (32 /spl mu/eV) obtained at low temperature along with the nonlinear temperature dependence of the homogeneous linewidth indicates that the quantization of acoustic phonon modes leads to strong suppression of dephasing associated with electron-phonon interactions in nanocrystals. The dependence of the spectral hole width on the modulation frequency also reveals exciton spectral migration occurring on a time scale of order of 100 /spl mu/s.

The persistent spectral hole-burning (PSHB) phenomenon was observed in semiconductor quantum dots, CdSe , CuCl , and CuBr , embedded in glass and crystal. In inhomogeneously broadened exciton absorption spectra of these dots, the narrow bleaching hole and its associated structure are made by the narrowband laser excitation and are conserved for more than several hours at 2 K after the laser irradiation. The observation of the PSHB phenomenon in these four kinds of samples shows the generality of the phenomenon in semiconductor quantum dots and requires the existence of more than one ground-state configurations of the total system consisting of quantum dots and surrounding matrix. It means that not only the size distribution but also these ground-state configurations give inhomoge-neous broadening to semiconductor quantum dots. Thermally annealing and light-induced hole-filling phenomena were observed. Hole-burning and hole-filling mechanisms are discussed. Quantum dots consisting of 103–104 atoms behave like molecules or ions in matrix to give the PSHB phenomenon.

Summary form only given.The coherent response of excitons in semiconductor nanostructures, as measured in four wave mixing (FWM) experiments, depends strongly on the inhomogeneous broadening of the exciton transition. We investigate GaAs-AlGaAs single quantum wells (SQW) of 4 nm to 25 nm well width. Two main mechanisms are found to be important. First, the excitation-induced dephasing FWM signal (EID), which leads to a strong dependence of the signal on the angle between the linear input polarizations. The presence of the EID in the mainly homogeneously broadened sample (25 nm) is shown by the beating between EID and two-photon coherence (TPC) at the exciton for negative delay and co-linear polarized excitation. It vanishes for cross-polarized excitation, thus excluding the importance of local-field effects.

We study exciton dephasing in 8 nm GaAs quantum wells (QW) at 8 K by resonantly exciting the excitons at low densities. For this, we perform femtosecond degenerate four-wave mixing (DFWM) measurements using two laser beams. The excitons in the QWs are inhomogeneously broadened, with a photoluminescence linewidth of 1.8 meV. We investigate how the time integrated DFWM signal and its decay rate $\ensuremath{\eta}$ change as the average intensity of either of the two exciting beams is varied separately. We find that the dependence of $\ensuremath{\eta}$ on the intensity of the first pulse is about twice as that for the delayed pulse. We compare the results with a theory based on optical Bloch equations and relaxation rate approximation, accounting phenomenologically for dephasing due to exciton-exciton scattering.