Generation of twin photon beams in 1D microcavities

Abstract

The recent development of interbranch optical parametric oscillation (OPO) in 2D vertical coupled microcavities [1] or 1D microcavities [2] opens new path towards the realization of monolithic micro-OPOs and for the generation of twin photon beams useful in quantum optics applications. It is now well established that very large Chi(3) polaritonic non-linearities in semiconductor microcavities operating in the strong-coupling regime [3] can be used to achieve low-threshold OPO. In conventional planar microcavities, the required phase-matching is obtained thanks to the strong coupling of excitons and photons. Nevertheless, single planar microcavities suffer from several drawbacks that prevent its use as a convenient device: (i) the required strong light-matter coupling regime is achieved only at low temperature, (ii) the pump laser must be adjusted to a specific angle, (iii) signal and idler beams are intrinsically strongly un-balanced, thus precluding practical applications. Alternatively, it has been demonstrated that interbranch parametric scattering in coupled microcavities allows to relax the requirement for a strong-coupling regime, thus leading to higher operating temperature [1]. In the present work, we show that interbranch parametric scattering in 1D microcavities also allows to relax this constraint as well as to generate efficient signal and idler beams with balanced intensities. The OPO regime is achieved and studied both at 4K in the strong-coupling regime, as well as above 100K in the weak-coupling regime. [1] C. Diederichs, et al., Nature 440, 904 (2006). [2] G. Dasbach et al., Phys. Rev. B 71, 161308R (2005) [3] P. G. Savvidis et al., Phys. Rev. Lett. 84, 1547 (2000)