Electron wavefunction probing in room-temperature semiconductors: direct observation of Rabi oscillations and self-induced transparency

Abstract

Quantum coherent light-matter interactions have been at the forefront of scientific interest since the fundamental predictions of Einstein and the later work of Rabi. Direct observation of quantum coherent interactions entails probing the electronic wavefunction which requires that the electronic state of the matter does not de-phase during the measurement, a condition that can be satisfied by lengthening the coherence time or by shortening the observation time. The short de-phasing time in semiconductors has dictated that all coherent effects reported to date have been recorded directly only at cryogenic temperatures. Here we report on the first direct electronic wavefunction probing in a room-temperature semiconductor. Employing an ultrafast characterization scheme we have demonstrated Rabi oscillations and self-induced transparency in an electrically driven, room-temperature semiconductor laser amplifier, revealing the most intimate details of the light-matter interactions seen to date. The ability to employ quantum effects in solid-state media, which operate at elevated temperatures, will finally bring true quantum mechanical concepts into the realm of practical devices.

References in corpus (2)

• Optical control of spin coherence in singly charged (In,Ga)As/GaAs quantum dots
• Quantum state preparation in semiconductor dots by adiabatic rapid passage

Cited by in corpus (8)

• Optoelectronic device simulations based on macroscopic Maxwell-Bloch equations
• Rabi oscillations of a quantum dot exciton coupled to acoustic phonons: coherence and population readout
• Coherent control in a semiconductor optical amplifier operating at room temperature
• Optical amplifier based on guided polaritons in GaN and ZnO
• Nonlinear pulse propagation in InAs/InP quantum-dot optical amplifiers: Rabi-oscillations in the presence of non-resonant nonlinearities
• Excited states of neutral and charged excitons in single strongly asymmetric InP-based nanostructures emitting in the telecom C band
• Ramsey fringes in a room temperature quantum dot semiconductor optical amplifier
• Spin-current amplification by stimulated spin pumping