Coulomb-induced suppression of band-edge singularities in the optical spectra of realistic quantum-wire structures

3D Bragg Coherent Diffraction Imaging of Extended Nanowires: Defect Formation in Highly Strained InGaAs Quantum Wells

InGaAs quantum wells embedded in GaAs nanowires can serve as compact near-infrared emitters for direct integration onto Si complementary metal oxide semiconductor technology. While the core-shell geometry in principle allows for a greater tuning of composition and emission, especially farther into the infrared, the practical limits of elastic strain accommodation in quantum wells on multifaceted nanowires have not been established. One barrier to progress is the difficulty of directly comparing the emission characteristics and the precise microstructure of a single nanowire. Here we report an approach to correlating quantum well morphology, strain, defects, and emission to understand the limits of elastic strain accommodation in nanowire quantum wells specific to their geometry. We realize full 3D Bragg coherent diffraction imaging (BCDI) of intact quantum wells on vertically oriented epitaxial nanowires, which enables direct correlation with single-nanowire photoluminescence. By growing In_0.2Ga_0.8As quantum wells of distinct thicknesses on different facets of the same nanowire, we identified the critical thickness at which defects are nucleated. A correlation with a traditional transmission electron microscopy analysis confirms that BCDI can image the extended structure of defects. Finite element simulations of electron and hole states explain the emission characteristics arising from strained and partially relaxed regions. This approach, imaging the 3D strain and microstructure of intact nanowire core-shell structures with application-relevant dimensions, can aid the development of predictive models that enable the design of new compact infrared emitters.

Calculation of electron-hole recombination probability using explicitly correlated Hartree-Fock method

The electron-hole explicitly correlated Hartree-Fock method (eh-XCHF) is presented as a general strategy for investigation of electron-hole correlation and computation of electron-hole recombination probability. The eh-XCHF method is a variational method which uses explicitly correlated wavefunction that depends on the electron-hole inter-particle distances. It is shown that the explicitly correlated ansatz provides a systematic route to variationally minimize the total energy. The parabolic quantum dot is used as the benchmark system and the eh-XCHF method is used for computation of the ground state energy and electron-hole recombination probability. The results are compared to Hartree-Fock and explicitly correlated full configuration interaction (R12-FCI) calculations. The results indicate that an accurate description of the electron-hole wavefunction at short electron-hole inter-particle distances is crucial for qualitative description of the electron-hole recombination probability. The eh-XCHF method successfully addresses this issue and comparison of eh-XCHF calculations with R12-FCI shows good agreement. The quality of the mean field approximation for electron-hole system is also investigated by comparing HF and R12-FCI energies for electron-electron and electron-hole systems. It was found that performance of the mean field approximation is worse for the electron-hole system as compared to the corresponding electron-electron system.

Single nanowire extinction spectroscopy

Here we show the first direct extinction spectra of single one-dimensional (1D) semiconductor nanostructures obtained at room temperature utilizing a spatial modulation approach. (1) For these materials, ensemble averaging in conventional extinction spectroscopy has limited our understanding of the interplay between carrier confinement and their electrostatic interactions. (2-4) By probing individual CdSe nanowires (NWs), we have identified and assigned size-dependent exciton transitions occurring across the visible. In turn, we have revealed the existence of room temperature 1D excitons in the narrowest NWs.

Nonlinear photoluminescence excitation spectroscopy of carbon nanotubes: exploring the upper density limit of one-dimensional excitons

We have observed that photoemission from single-walled carbon nanotubes saturates in intensity as the excitation intensity increases. Each emission peak arising from specific-chirality tubes exhibited a saturation value independent of the excitation wavelength, suggesting an upper limit on the exciton density for each nanotube species. We developed a model based on diffusion-limited exciton-exciton annihilation, which allowed us to estimate exciton densities in the saturation regime. The estimated densities were found to be still substantially smaller than the expected Mott density.

T-shaped GaAs quantum-wire lasers and the exciton Mott transition

T-shaped GaAs quantum-wire (T-wire) lasers fabricated by the cleaved-edge overgrowth method with molecular beam epitaxy on the interface improved by a growth-interrupt high-temperature anneal are measured to study the laser device physics and fundamental many-body physics in clean one-dimensional (1D) systems. A current-injection T-wire laser that has 20 periods of T-wires in the active region and a 0.5 mm long cavity with high-reflection coatings shows a low threshold current of 0.27 mA at 30 K. The origin of the laser gain above the lasing threshold is studied with the high-quality T-wire lasers by means of optical pumping. The lasing energy is about 5 meV below the photoluminescence (PL) peak of free excitons, and is on the electron-hole (e-h) plasma PL band at a high e-h carrier density. The observed energy shift excludes the laser gain due to free excitons, and it suggests a contribution from the e-h plasma instead. A systematic micro-PL study reveals that the PL evolves with the e-h density from a sharp exciton peak, via a biexciton peak, to an e-h-plasma PL band. The data demonstrate an important role of biexcitons in the exciton Mott transition. Comparison with microscopic theories points out some problems in the picture of the exciton Mott transition.

Exciton effect in deformed carbon nanotubes

The exciton states in deformed single-walled carbon nanotubes (SWNTs), under two kinds of strain, i.e., uniaxial and torsional, are theoretically studied in the Su-Schrieffer-Heeger (SSH) model, supplemented by long-range Coulomb interactions. It is found that for semiconducting zigzag tubes, the exciton binding energy E(b) and the (quasi-)continuum edge E(c) are very sensitive to the uniaxial strain, but not to the torsional one, showing two different kinds of variation behaviour of E(b) with increasing uniaxial strain, of which one decreases monotonically, and the other first increases and then decreases. Additionally, the excitons in torsionally distorted armchair tubes and uniaxially strained metallic zigzag tubes have also been studied, showing increased E(b) and E(c) with increasing strain.

Intersubband exciton relaxation dynamics in single-walled carbon nanotubes

We study exciton (EX) dynamics in single-walled carbon nanotubes (SWNTs) included in polymethylmethacrylate by two-color pump-probe experiments with unprecedented temporal resolution. In the semiconducting SWNTs, we resolve the intersubband energy relaxation from the EX2 to the EX1 transition and find time constants of about 40 fs. The observation of a photoinduced absorption band strictly correlated to the photobleaching of the EX1 transition supports the excitonic model for primary excitations in SWNTs. We also detect in the time domain coherent oscillations due to the radial breathing modes at approximately 250 cm(-1).

Stability of high-density one-dimensional excitons in carbon nanotubes under high laser excitation

Through ultrafast pump-probe spectroscopy with intense pump pulses and a wide continuum probe, we show that interband exciton peaks in single-walled carbon nanotubes (SWNTs) are extremely stable under high laser excitations. Estimates of the initial densities of excitons from the excitation conditions, combined with recent theoretical calculations of exciton Bohr radii for SWNTs, suggest that their positions do not change at all even near the Mott density. In addition, we found that the presence of lowest-subband excitons broadens all absorption peaks, including those in the second-subband range, which provides a consistent explanation for the complex spectral dependence of pump-probe signals reported for SWNTs.

Excitons in carbon nanotubes: an ab initio symmetry-based approach

The optical absorption spectrum of the carbon (4,2) nanotube is computed using an ab initio many-body approach which takes into account excitonic effects. We develop a new method involving a local basis set which is symmetric with respect to the screw-symmetry of the tube. Such a method has the advantages of scaling faster than plane-wave methods and allowing for a precise determination of the symmetry character of the single-particle states, two-particle excitations, and selection rules. The binding energy of the lowest, optically active states is approximately 0.8 eV. The corresponding exciton wave functions are delocalized along the circumference of the tube and localized in the direction of the tube axis.

Solid state effects on exciton states and optical properties of PPV

We perform ab initio calculations of optical properties for a typical semiconductor conjugated polymer, poly-para-phenylenevinylene, in both isolated chain and crystalline packing. In order to obtain results for excitonic energies and real-space wave functions we explicitly include electron-hole interaction within the density-matrix formalism. We find that the details of crystalline arrangement crucially affect the optical properties, leading to a richer exciton structure and opening nonradiative decay channels. This has implications for the optical activity and optoelectronic applications of polymer films.

Exciton formation in semiconductors and the influence of a photonic environment

A fully microscopic theory is presented for interacting electrons, holes, photons, and phonons in semiconductor heterostructures. The formation dynamics and statistics of incoherent excitons are analyzed for different densities, lattice temperatures, and photonic environments. Luminescence experiments are shown to depend strongly on the photonic environment in contrast to suggested terahertz absorption measurements. Whereas luminescence in free space is dominated by plasma contributions, terahertz absorption should be able to directly measure excitonic populations.

Few-particle effects in semiconductor quantum dots: observation of multicharged excitons

We investigate experimentally and theoretically few-particle effects in the optical spectra of single quantum dots (QDs). Photodepletion of the QD together with the slow hopping transport of impurity-bound electrons back to the QD are employed to efficiently control the number of electrons present in the QD. By investigating structurally identical QDs, we show that the spectral evolutions observed can be attributed to intrinsic, multi-particle-related effects, as opposed to extrinsic QD-impurity environment-related interactions. From our theoretical calculations we identify the distinct transitions related to excitons and excitons charged with up to five additional electrons, as well as neutral and charged biexcitons.

Many-body renormalization of semiconductor quantum wire excitons: absorption, gain, binding, and unbinding

We consider theoretically the formation and stability of quasi-one-dimensional many-body excitons in GaAs quantum wire structures under external photoexcitation conditions by solving the dynamically screened Bethe-Salpeter equation for realistic Coulomb interaction. In agreement with several recent experimental findings the calculated excitonic peak shows weak carrier-density dependence up to (and even above) the Mott transition density, nc approximately 3 x 10(5) cm(-1). Above nc we find considerable optical gain demonstrating compellingly the possibility of a one-dimensional quantum wire laser operation.