Challenges
Datasets
Workspaces
Papers
Discussions
Leaderboard
Log inSign up
Challenges
Datasets
Workspaces
Papers
Discussions
Leaderboard
Blog
Job Board
Q3AS

© 2026 Aqora Quantum S.A.S.

TermsPrivacyLegal Notice

arXiv:cond-mat/0303392 · Physical Review A

Polariton condensation and lasing in optical microcavities: The decoherence-driven crossover

Marzena Hanna Szymańska, P. B. Littlewood, Benjamin D. Simons

Published Jul 25, 2003• 30 citations
arXivHTMLPDF

Abstract

We explore the behavior of a system that consists of a photon mode dipole coupled to a medium of two-level oscillators in a microcavity in the presence of decoherence. We consider two types of decoherence processes, which are analogous to magnetic and nonmagnetic impurities in superconductors. We study different phases of this system as the decoherence strength and the excitation density are changed. For a low decoherence we obtain a polariton condensate with comparable excitonic and photonic parts at low densities and a BCS-like state with a bigger photon component due to the fermionic phase-space filling effect at high densities. In both cases there is a large gap in the density of states. As the decoherence is increased, the gap is broadened and suppressed, resulting in a gapless condensate and finally a suppression of the coherence in a low-density regime and a laser at the high-density limit. A crossover between these regimes is studied in a self-consistent way analogous to the Abrikosov and Gor'kov theory of gapless superconductivity [A. A. Abrikosov and L. P. Gor'kov, Sov. Phys. JETP 12, 1243 (1960)].

DOI
10.1103/physreva.68.013818

Related papers

Phase diagram of microcavity exciton-polariton condensates

Dinh-Hoi Bui, Van-Nham Phan

In this work, we study the exciton-polariton condensate phase transition in a microcavity matter-light system in which electron-hole Coulomb interaction and matter-light coupling effects are treated on an equal footing. In the framework of the unrestricted Hartree-Fock approximation applying the two-dimensional exciton-polariton model, we derive the self-consistent equations determining simultaneously the excitonic and the photonic condenstate order parameters. In the thermal-equilibrium limit, we find a condensed state of the exciton-polariton systems and phase diagrams are then constructed. At a given low temperature, the condensate by its nature shows a crossover from an excitonic to a polaritonic and finally photonic condensed state as the excitation density increases at large detuning. Without the detuning, the excitonic condensed state disappears whereas the polaritonic or photonic phases dominate. The crossover is also found by lowering the Coulomb interaction at a finite matter-light coupling. Lowering the Coulomb interaction or increasing the temperature, the excitonic Mott transition occurs, at which the exciton-polariton condensates dissociate to free electron-hole/photon. Depending on temperature and excitation density, the phase transition of the exciton-polariton condensates is also addressed in signatures of photoluminescence mapping to the photonic momentum distribution.

arXiv:1702.03659•Europhysics Letters (EPL)•Dec 1, 2016•4 citations

BCS Wave-Function Approach to the BEC-BCS Crossover of Exciton-Polariton Condensates

Tim Byrnes, Tomoyuki Horikiri, Natsuko Ishida +1 more

The crossover between low and high density regimes of exciton-polariton condensates is examined using a BCS wave-function approach. Our approach is an extension of the BEC-BCS crossover theory for excitons, but includes a cavity photon field. The approach can describe both the low density limit, where the system can be described as a Bose-Einstein condensate (BEC) of exciton-polaritons, and the high density limit, where the system enters a photon-dominated regime. In contrast to the exciton BEC-BCS crossover where the system approaches an electron-hole plasma, the polariton high density limit has strongly correlated electron-hole pairs. At intermediate densities, there is a regime with BCS-like properties, with a peak at nonzero momentum of the singlet pair function. We calculate the expected photoluminescence and give several experimental signatures of the crossover.

arXiv:1005.3141•Physical Review Letters•Oct 26, 2010•71 citations

Crossover from exciton-polariton to photon Bose-Einstein condensation

Elena Kammann, Hamid Ohadi, Maria Maragkou +2 more

BEC of exciton-polaritons and related effects such as superfluidity1,2, spontaneous symmetry breaking3,4 and quantised vortices5,6 open way to creation of novel light sources7 and optical logic elements8. Remarkable observations of exciton-polariton BEC in microcavities9-12 have been reported in the recent ten years. Very recently, thermalisation and subsequent condensation of cavity photons in a dye-filled microcavity have been observed13. Here we show that BEC of both exciton-polaritons and photons can be created in the same system under different optical excitation conditions. A dynamic phase transition between a photon and a polariton BEC takes place after a single high-power excitation pulse and we find both condensed states in thermal equilibrium with the excited states. At the crossover, photons and polaritons coexist, which results in a decrease in the long-range spatial coherence. Build-up and successive depinning of polarisation is observed at the threshold of both polariton and photon condensation.

arXiv:1103.4831•Mar 24, 2011•1 citation

Bose condensation in a model microcavity

EASTHAM, PAUL

We study the equilibrium properties of a system of dipole-active excitons coupled to a single photon mode at fixed total excitation. Treating the presence or absence of a trapped exciton as a two-level system produces a model, the Dicke model, that is exactly soluble. It gives a simple description of polariton condensation in optical cavities, beyond the low-density bosonic regime.

•Jan 1, 2000•20 citations

BCS-BEC crossover in a system of microcavity polaritons

Jonathan Keeling, P. R. Eastham, Marzena Hanna Szymańska +1 more

We investigate the thermodynamics and signatures of a polariton condensate over a range of densities, using a model of microcavity polaritons with internal structure. We determine a phase diagram for this system including fluctuation corrections to the mean-field theory. At low densities the condensation temperature ${T}_{c}$ behaves like that for point bosons. At higher densities, when ${T}_{c}$ approaches the Rabi splitting, ${T}_{c}$ deviates from the form for point bosons, and instead approaches the result of a BCS-like mean-field theory. This crossover occurs at densities much less than the Mott density. We show that current experiments are in a density range where the phase boundary is described by the BCS-like mean-field boundary. We investigate the influence of inhomogeneous broadening and detuning of excitons on the phase diagram.

arXiv:cond-mat/0503184•Physical Review B•Sep 19, 2005•121 citations

Bose–Einstein Condensation of Mixed States of Excitons and Photons

S. A. Moskalenko, David W. Snoke

Introduction. Polaritons and Semiconductor Microcavities As we have mentioned previously, BEC of excitons or biexcitons and lasing can be seen as two limits of the same theory. Lasing occurs in the case of strong electron-photon coupling (recombination rate fast compared with interparticle-scattering rate) while excitonic BEC occurs in the case of weak electron-photon coupling (recombination rate slow compared with the interparticle-scattering rate.) A laser can be seen as a Bose condensate in which the long-range phase coherence exists in the photon states [1], while in the exciton condensate the coherence exists in the electronic states. This is one of the reasons for some of the confusing debates in the early history of excitonic Bose condensation – in many systems there is not a sharp distinction between an excitonic condensate and supperradiance, i.e., luminescence with enhanced intensity due to stimulated emission [2-4]. In the previous chapters, we have so far considered a laser light source only as a source of excitons by means of quantum transitions. In Chapter 6, the laser radiation was taken into account as a given external factor. This chapter is dedicated to phenomena related to a strong and noticeable exciton-photon interaction, when the light significantly influences the energy spectrum of the high-density excitons [5-9]. As we will see, this leads to many fascinating effects related to instabilities. A strong exciton-photon interaction implies a strong polariton effect, in which photon and exciton states are mixed (as in Fig. 1.3). When this mixing is strong, it is not obvious how to define the ground state of the system.

Cambridge University Press eBooks•Feb 28, 2000•1 citation
We explore the behavior of a system that consists of a photon mode dipole coupled to a medium of two-level oscillators in a microcavity in the presence of decoherence. We consider two types of decoherence processes, which are analogous to magnetic and nonmagnetic impurities in superconductors. We study different phases of this system as the decoherence strength and the excitation density are changed. For a low decoherence we obtain a polariton condensate with comparable excitonic and photonic parts at low densities and a BCS-like state with a bigger photon component due to the fermionic phase-space filling effect at high densities. In both cases there is a large gap in the density of states. As the decoherence is increased, the gap is broadened and suppressed, resulting in a gapless condensate and finally a suppression of the coherence in a low-density regime and a laser at the high-density limit. A crossover between these regimes is studied in a self-consistent way analogous to the Abrikosov and Gor'kov theory of gapless superconductivity [A. A. Abrikosov and L. P. Gor'kov, Sov. Phys. JETP 12, 1243 (1960)].
In this work, we study the exciton-polariton condensate phase transition in a microcavity matter-light system in which electron-hole Coulomb interaction and matter-light coupling effects are treated on an equal footing. In the framework of the unrestricted Hartree-Fock approximation applying the two-dimensional exciton-polariton model, we derive the self-consistent equations determining simultaneously the excitonic and the photonic condenstate order parameters. In the thermal-equilibrium limit, we find a condensed state of the exciton-polariton systems and phase diagrams are then constructed. At a given low temperature, the condensate by its nature shows a crossover from an excitonic to a polaritonic and finally photonic condensed state as the excitation density increases at large detuning. Without the detuning, the excitonic condensed state disappears whereas the polaritonic or photonic phases dominate. The crossover is also found by lowering the Coulomb interaction at a finite matter-light coupling. Lowering the Coulomb interaction or increasing the temperature, the excitonic Mott transition occurs, at which the exciton-polariton condensates dissociate to free electron-hole/photon. Depending on temperature and excitation density, the phase transition of the exciton-polariton condensates is also addressed in signatures of photoluminescence mapping to the photonic momentum distribution.
The crossover between low and high density regimes of exciton-polariton condensates is examined using a BCS wave-function approach. Our approach is an extension of the BEC-BCS crossover theory for excitons, but includes a cavity photon field. The approach can describe both the low density limit, where the system can be described as a Bose-Einstein condensate (BEC) of exciton-polaritons, and the high density limit, where the system enters a photon-dominated regime. In contrast to the exciton BEC-BCS crossover where the system approaches an electron-hole plasma, the polariton high density limit has strongly correlated electron-hole pairs. At intermediate densities, there is a regime with BCS-like properties, with a peak at nonzero momentum of the singlet pair function. We calculate the expected photoluminescence and give several experimental signatures of the crossover.
BEC of exciton-polaritons and related effects such as superfluidity1,2, spontaneous symmetry breaking3,4 and quantised vortices5,6 open way to creation of novel light sources7 and optical logic elements8. Remarkable observations of exciton-polariton BEC in microcavities9-12 have been reported in the recent ten years. Very recently, thermalisation and subsequent condensation of cavity photons in a dye-filled microcavity have been observed13. Here we show that BEC of both exciton-polaritons and photons can be created in the same system under different optical excitation conditions. A dynamic phase transition between a photon and a polariton BEC takes place after a single high-power excitation pulse and we find both condensed states in thermal equilibrium with the excited states. At the crossover, photons and polaritons coexist, which results in a decrease in the long-range spatial coherence. Build-up and successive depinning of polarisation is observed at the threshold of both polariton and photon condensation.
We investigate the thermodynamics and signatures of a polariton condensate over a range of densities, using a model of microcavity polaritons with internal structure. We determine a phase diagram for this system including fluctuation corrections to the mean-field theory. At low densities the condensation temperature Tc{T}_{c}Tc​ behaves like that for point bosons. At higher densities, when Tc{T}_{c}Tc​ approaches the Rabi splitting, Tc{T}_{c}Tc​ deviates from the form for point bosons, and instead approaches the result of a BCS-like mean-field theory. This crossover occurs at densities much less than the Mott density. We show that current experiments are in a density range where the phase boundary is described by the BCS-like mean-field boundary. We investigate the influence of inhomogeneous broadening and detuning of excitons on the phase diagram.
Introduction. Polaritons and Semiconductor Microcavities As we have mentioned previously, BEC of excitons or biexcitons and lasing can be seen as two limits of the same theory. Lasing occurs in the case of strong electron-photon coupling (recombination rate fast compared with interparticle-scattering rate) while excitonic BEC occurs in the case of weak electron-photon coupling (recombination rate slow compared with the interparticle-scattering rate.) A laser can be seen as a Bose condensate in which the long-range phase coherence exists in the photon states [1], while in the exciton condensate the coherence exists in the electronic states. This is one of the reasons for some of the confusing debates in the early history of excitonic Bose condensation – in many systems there is not a sharp distinction between an excitonic condensate and supperradiance, i.e., luminescence with enhanced intensity due to stimulated emission [2-4]. In the previous chapters, we have so far considered a laser light source only as a source of excitons by means of quantum transitions. In Chapter 6, the laser radiation was taken into account as a given external factor. This chapter is dedicated to phenomena related to a strong and noticeable exciton-photon interaction, when the light significantly influences the energy spectrum of the high-density excitons [5-9]. As we will see, this leads to many fascinating effects related to instabilities. A strong exciton-photon interaction implies a strong polariton effect, in which photon and exciton states are mixed (as in Fig. 1.3). When this mixing is strong, it is not obvious how to define the ground state of the system.