802 research outputs found
Observation of bright polariton solitons in a semiconductor microcavity
Microcavity polaritons are composite half-light half-matter quasi-particles,
which have recently been demonstrated to exhibit rich physical properties, such
as non-equilibrium Bose-Einstein condensation, parametric scattering and
superfluidity. At the same time, polaritons have some important advantages over
photons for information processing applications, since their excitonic
component leads to weaker diffraction and stronger inter-particle interactions,
implying, respectively, tighter localization and lower powers for nonlinear
functionality. Here we present the first experimental observations of bright
polariton solitons in a strongly coupled semiconductor microcavity. The
polariton solitons are shown to be non-diffracting high density wavepackets,
that are strongly localised in real space with a corresponding broad spectrum
in momentum space. Unlike solitons known in other matter-wave systems such as
Bose condensed ultracold atomic gases, they are non-equilibrium and rely on a
balance between losses and external pumping. Microcavity polariton solitons are
excited on picosecond timescales, and thus have significant benefits for
ultrafast switching and transfer of information over their light only
counterparts, semiconductor cavity lasers (VCSELs), which have only nanosecond
response time
Dark polariton-solitons in semiconductor microcavities
We report the existence, symmetry breaking and other instabilities of dark
polariton-solitons in semiconductor microcavities operating in the strong
coupling regime. These half-light half-matter solitons are potential candidates
for applications in all-optical signal processing. Their excitation time and
required pump powers are a few orders of magnitude less than those of their
weakly coupled light-only counterparts.Comment: submitted to PR
Cavity solitons in vertical-cavity surface-emitting lasers
We investigate a control of the motion of localized structures of light by
means of delay feedback in the transverse section of a broad area nonlinear
optical system. The delayed feedback is found to induce a spontaneous motion of
a solitary localized structure that is stationary and stable in the absence of
feedback. We focus our analysis on an experimentally relevant system namely the
Vertical-Cavity Surface-Emitting Laser (VCSEL). In the absence of the delay
feedback we present experimental evidence of stationary localized structures in
a 80 m aperture VCSEL. The spontaneous formation of localized structures
takes place above the lasing threshold and under optical injection. Then, we
consider the effect of the time-delayed optical feedback and investigate
analytically the role of the phase of the feedback and the carrier lifetime on
the self-mobility properties of the localized structures. We show that these
two parameters affect strongly the space time dynamics of two-dimensional
localized structures. We derive an analytical formula for the threshold
associated with drift instability of localized structures and a normal form
equation describing the slow time evolution of the speed of the moving
structure.Comment: 7 pages, 5 figure
Separation and acceleration of analogues of magnetic monopoles in semiconductor microcavities
Half-integer topological defects in polariton condensates can be regarded as
magnetic charges, with respect to built-in effective magnetic fields present in
microcavities. We show how an integer topological defect can be separated into
a pair of half-integer ones, paving the way towards flows of magnetic charges:
spin currents or magnetricity. We discuss the corresponding experimental
implementation within microwires (with half-solitons) and planar microcavities
(with half-vortices).Comment: 18 Pages, 8 figures, submitted to New Journal of Physics (special
issue
Sculpting oscillators with light within a nonlinear quantum fluid
Seeing macroscopic quantum states directly remains an elusive goal. Particles
with boson symmetry can condense into such quantum fluids producing rich
physical phenomena as well as proven potential for interferometric devices
[1-10]. However direct imaging of such quantum states is only fleetingly
possible in high-vacuum ultracold atomic condensates, and not in
superconductors. Recent condensation of solid state polariton quasiparticles,
built from mixing semiconductor excitons with microcavity photons, offers
monolithic devices capable of supporting room temperature quantum states
[11-14] that exhibit superfluid behaviour [15,16]. Here we use microcavities on
a semiconductor chip supporting two-dimensional polariton condensates to
directly visualise the formation of a spontaneously oscillating quantum fluid.
This system is created on the fly by injecting polaritons at two or more
spatially-separated pump spots. Although oscillating at tuneable THz-scale
frequencies, a simple optical microscope can be used to directly image their
stable archetypal quantum oscillator wavefunctions in real space. The
self-repulsion of polaritons provides a solid state quasiparticle that is so
nonlinear as to modify its own potential. Interference in time and space
reveals the condensate wavepackets arise from non-equilibrium solitons. Control
of such polariton condensate wavepackets demonstrates great potential for
integrated semiconductor-based condensate devices.Comment: accepted in Nature Physic
Observation of electro-activated localized structures in broad area VCSELs
We demonstrate experimentally the electro-activation of a localized optical
structure in a coherently driven broad-area vertical-cavity surface-emitting
laser (VCSEL) operated below threshold. Control is achieved by
electro-optically steering a writing beam through a pre-programmable switch
based on a photorefractive funnel waveguide.Comment: 5 Figure
Nonlinear Effects in Multi-Photon Polaritonics
We consider theoretically nonlinear effects in a semiconductor quantum well
embedded inside a photonic microcavity. Two-photon absorption by a 2p exciton
state is considered and investigated; the matrix element of two-photon
absorption is calculated. We compute the emission spectrum of the sample and
demonstrate that under coherent pumping the nonlinearity of the two photon
absorption process gives rise to bistability.Comment: Accepted to Optics Express, 7 main pages + 3 figures + supplement
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