Giant up-conversion efficiency of InGaAs quantum dots in a planar microcavity

Qinfeng Xu; Carlo Piermarocchi; Yuriy V Pershin; G J Salamo; Min Xiao; Xiaoyong Wang; Chih-Kang Shih

doi:10.1038/srep03953

Giant up-conversion efficiency of InGaAs quantum dots in a planar microcavity

Sci Rep. 2014 Feb 4:4:3953. doi: 10.1038/srep03953.

Authors

Qinfeng Xu¹, Carlo Piermarocchi², Yuriy V Pershin³, G J Salamo⁴, Min Xiao⁵, Xiaoyong Wang⁶, Chih-Kang Shih⁷

Affiliations

¹ 1] National Laboratory of Solid State Microstructures and School of Physics, Nanjing University, Nanjing 210093, China [2] Department of Physics and Optoelectronic Engineering, Ludong University, Yantai 264025, China.
² Department of Physics and Astronomy, Michigan State University, East Lansing, MI 48824, USA.
³ Department of Physics and Astronomy and USC Nanocenter, University of South Carolina, Columbia, SC 29208, USA.
⁴ Department of Physics, University of Arkansas, Fayetteville, AR 72701, USA.
⁵ 1] National Laboratory of Solid State Microstructures and School of Physics, Nanjing University, Nanjing 210093, China [2] Department of Physics, University of Arkansas, Fayetteville, AR 72701, USA.
⁶ 1] National Laboratory of Solid State Microstructures and School of Physics, Nanjing University, Nanjing 210093, China [2] Department of Physics, the University of Texas at Austin, Austin, TX 78712, USA.
⁷ Department of Physics, the University of Texas at Austin, Austin, TX 78712, USA.

Abstract

Self-assembled InGaAs quantum dots (QDs) were fabricated inside a planar microcavity with two vertical cavity modes. This allowed us to excite the QDs coupled to one of the vertical cavity modes through two propagating cavity modes to study their down- and up-converted photoluminescence (PL). The up-converted PL increased continuously with the increasing temperature, reaching an intensity level comparable to that of the down-converted PL at ~120 K. This giant efficiency in the up-converted PL of InGaAs QDs was enhanced by about 2 orders of magnitude with respect to a similar structure without cavity. We tentatively explain the enhanced up-converted signal as a direct consequence of the modified spontaneous emission properties of the QDs in the microcavity, combined with the phonon absorption and emission effects.

Publication types

Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't
Research Support, U.S. Gov't, Non-P.H.S.