Experimental Studies of Mode Coupling and Prospects for Lasing in 3- Dimensionally Confined Microcavities

摘要

We propose to investigate a new microcavity emitter based on 3- dimensional confinement of an optical mode coupled to an exciton-polariton quantum well (QW) light emitter. The microcavity is a novel dielectric structure based on both lateral native oxide (AlxOy) confinement and vertical confinement due to GaAs/AlxOy distributed Bragg reflectors (DBRs). The interest in this system stems from the QW-confined exciton-polariton's unique feature as a radiation source of superradiance into the QW normal direction (due to its lateral spatial extent) In principle. such an extended source is capable of coupling 100% of its spontaneous light emission into a planar microcavity optical mode. The nearly ideal coupling allows novel studies of quantum optics in semiconductor microcavities associated with unity beta such as Rabi oscillations, ultralow threshold lasing, and generation of nonclassical light. In practice however, the coupling from the exciton-polariton to the semiconductor microcavity is limited by dephasing either due to inhomogeneous broadening associated with QW width fluctuations or homogeneous broadening arising from phonon and carrier-carrier scattering.