Avalanche amplification of a single exciton in a semiconductor nanowire

Abstract

Interfacing single photons and electrons is a crucial ingredient for sharing quantum information between remote solid-state qubits. Semiconductor nanowires offer the unique possibility to combine optical quantum dots with avalanche photodiodes, thus enabling the conversion of an incoming single photon into a macroscopic current for efficient electrical detection. Currently, millions of excitation events are required to perform electrical read-out of an exciton qubit state. Here we demonstrate multiplication of carriers from only a single exciton generated in a quantum dot after tunneling into a nanowire avalanche photodiode. Due to the large amplification of both electrons and holes (> 10^4), we reduce by four orders of magnitude the number of excitation events required to electrically detect a single exciton generated in a quantum dot. This work represents a significant step towards single-shot electrical read-out and offers a new functionality for on-chip quantum information circuits.

References in corpus (4)

• Driven coherent oscillations of a single electron spin in a quantum dot
• Twinning superlattices in indium phosphide nanowires
• Bright single-photon sources in bottom-up tailored nanowires
• An avalanche-photodiode-based photon-number-resolving detector

Cited by in corpus (13)

• Observation of strongly entangled photon pairs from a nanowire quantum dot
• Observation of ballistic avalanche phenomena in nanoscale vertical InSe/BP heterostructures
• Electrical control over single hole spins in nanowire quantum dots
• Advances in the theory of III-V Nanowire Growth Dynamics
• Ultrafast photodetection in the quantum wells of single AlGaAs/GaAs-based nanowires
• Nanowire photodetectors based on wurtzite semiconductor heterostructures
• InP/InAsP Nanowire-based Spatially Separate Absorption and Multiplication Avalanche Photodetectors
• Persistent enhancement of the carrier density in electron irradiated InAs nanowires
• Thermally driven inhibition of superconducting vortex avalanches
• Effective separation of photogenerated electron-hole pairs by radial field facilitates ultrahigh photoresponse in single semiconductor nanowire photodetectors
• Experimental observation of anomalous supralinear response of single-photon detectors
• Enhanced photocurrent readout for a quantum dot qubit by bias modulation
• Localised excitation of a single photon source by a nanowaveguide