Cavity-enhanced second harmonic generation from Rydberg excitons in Cu${}_2$O

Abstract

Rydberg excitons in Cu${}_2$O provide a solid-state setting for creating giant optical nonlinearities. Here, we use second-harmonic generation (SHG) to study Rydberg excitons in a doubly resonant optical microcavity designed to enhance both the pump and second-harmonic fields. We observe even-parity exciton states in an optical cavity and extend cavity-based measurements of Rydberg excitons up to $n=10$. The SHG intensity depends strongly on pump cavity detuning, showing the dominant role of the microcavity is the enhancement of the intra-cavity pump field. Analysis reveals an additional enhancement from the resonant second-harmonic cavity giving an overall SHG enhancement factor of $21\pm 2$ inside the microcavity. These results establish cavity-enhanced SHG spectroscopy as a valuable tool for studying Rydberg excitons in microcavities and provide a pathway towards exploiting optical nonlinearities in Rydberg exciton polariton systems.

arXiv comment8 pages, 3 figures