Controlled photoluminescence in amorphous-silicon-nitride microcavities

Narrow-band and enhanced photoluminescence have been observed in hydrogenated amorphous-silicon-nitride microcavities. The distributed Bragg reflectors were fabricated using alternating layers of hydrogenated amorphous-silicon nitride and hydrogenated amorphous-silicon oxide. The microcavity resonance wavelength was designed to be at the maximum of the bulk hydrogenated amorphous-silicon-nitride luminescence spectrum. At the microcavity resonance, the phololuminescence amplitude is enhanced, while the photoluminescence linewidth is reduced with respect to the bulk hydrogenated amorphous-silicon nitride. © 2001 American Institute of Physics

A method for volume stabilization of single, dye-doped water microdroplets with femtoliter resolution

A self-control mechanism that stabilizes the size of Rhodamine B-doped water microdroplets standing on a superhydrophobic surface is demonstrated. The mechanism relies on the interplay between the condensation rate that was kept constant and evaporation rate induced by laser excitation which critically depends on the size of the microdroplets. The radii of individual water microdroplets (>5 um) stayed within a few nanometers during long time periods (up to 455 seconds). By blocking the laser excitation for 500 msec, the stable volume of individual microdroplets was shown to change stepwise.Comment: to appear in the J. Op. Soc. Am.

Dye lasing in optically manipulated liquid aerosols

We report lasing in airborne, rhodamine B-doped glycerol-water droplets with diameters ranging between 7.7 and 11.0 mu m, which were localized using optical tweezers. While being trapped near the focal point of an infrared laser, the droplets were pumped with a Q-switched green laser. Our experiments revealed nonlinear dependence of the intensity of the droplet whispering gallery modes (WGMs) on the pump laser fluence, indicating dye lasing. The average wavelength of the lasing WGMs could be tuned between 600 and 630 nm by changing the droplet size. These results may lead to new ways of probing airborne particles, exploiting the high sensitivity of stimulated emission to small perturbations in the droplet laser cavity and the gain medium

Radiative donor-acceptor pair recombination in TlInS2 single crystals

Photoluminescence (PL) spectra of TlInS2 layered single crystals were investigated in the 500-860 nm wavelength region and in the 11.5-100 K temperature range. We observed two PL bands centred at 515 nm (2.41 eV, A band) and 816 nm (1.52 eV, B band) at T = 11.5 K and an excitation intensity of 7.24 W cm-2. A detailed study of the A band was carried out as a function of temperature and excitation laser intensity. A red shift of the A band position was observed for both increasing temperature and decreasing excitation laser intensity in the range from 0.12 to 7.24 W cm-2. Analysis of the data indicates that the A band is due to radiative transitions from the moderately deep donor level located at 0.25 eV below the bottom of the conduction band to the shallow acceptor level located at 0.02 eV above the top of the valence band. An energy-level diagram for radiative donor-acceptor pair transitions in TlInS2 layered single crystals is proposed

Second-Harmonic Generation in Silicon Nitride Ring Resonators

The emerging field of silicon photonics seeks to unify the high bandwidth of optical communications with CMOS microelectronic circuits. Many components have been demonstrated for on-chip optical communications, including those that utilize the nonlinear optical properties of silicon[1, 2], silicon dioxide[3, 4] and silicon nitride[5, 6]. Processes such as second harmonic generation, which are enabled by the second-order susceptibility, have not been developed since the bulk $\chi^{(2)}$ vanishes in these centrosymmetric CMOS materials. Generating the lowest-order nonlinearity would open the window to a new array of CMOS-compatible optical devices capable of nonlinear functionalities not achievable with the?$\chi^{(3)}$ response such as electro-optic modulation, sum frequency up-conversion, and difference frequency generation. Here we demonstrate second harmonic (SH) generation in CMOS compatible integrated silicon nitride (Si3N4) waveguides. The $\chi^{(2)}$ response is induced in the centrosymmetric material by using the nanoscale structure to break the bulk symmetry. We use a high quality factor Q ring resonator cavity to enhance the efficiency of the nonlinear optical process and detect SH output with milliwatt input powers.Comment: 4 pages, 3 figure

Super-radiant surface emission from a quasi-cavity hot electron light emitter

The Hot Electron Light Emitting and Lasing in Semiconductor Heterostructure (HELLISH-1) device is a novel surface emitter which utilises hot carrier transport parallel to the layers of a Ga1 - xAlxAs p-n junction incorporating a single GaAs quantum well on the n-side of the junction plane. Non-equilibrium electrons are injected into the quantum well via tunnelling from the n-layer. In order to preserve the charge neutrality in the depletion region, the junction undergoes a self-induced internal biasing. As a result the built-in potential on the p-side is reduced and hence the injection of non-equilibrium holes into the quantum well in the active region is enhanced. The work presented here shows that a distributed Bragg reflector grown below the active region of the HELLISH device increases the emitted light intensity by two orders of magnitude and reduces the emission line-width by about a factor of 3 in comparison with the original HELLISH-1 structure. Therefore, the device can be operated as an ultrabright emitter with higher spectral purity

Semiconductor and dielectric microcavity spectroscopy

Semiconductor and dielectric microcavities are used for the localization of photons as well as the enhancement of photon density of states. The enhancement of photoluminescence, electroluminescence, and lasing by the use of microcavities leads to novel active and passive optoelectronic and photonic devices such as channel droppping filters, semiconductor lasers, and resonant cavity enhanced devices. Experimental results showing photoluminescence enhancement in active planar, lasing in active ellipsoidal microcavities as well as light scattering in passive and spherical microcavities are presented

Spherical silicon optical resonators: Possible applications to biosensing

We observed whispering gallery modes in the 90∘ elastic light scattering and 0∘ transmission spectra of a 500 μm silicon microsphere in the near-infrared telecommunication wavelengths. The whispering gallery modes have quality factors on the order of 105. An autocorrelation function analysis of the 90∘ elastic light scattering and 0∘ transmission spectra is performed. The differential autocorrelation of the 90∘ elastic light scattering and 0∘ transmission spectra reveal a spectral mode spacing 0.23 nm of the whispering gallery modes, which can be used for spectral calibration as well as the calibration of the microsphere size. The spectral shift of the whispering gallery modes can be measured for biosensing applications. An estimation analysis is performed for the adsorption of 30 DNA base pairs on the microsphere results in a wavelength shift of 0.57 nm, which is approximately 40 times the linewidth of the whispering gallery modes. This high sensitivity heralds silicon microspheres as possible candidates for biosensing applications

Enhancement and inhibition of photoluminescence in hydrogenated amorphous Silicon nitride microcavities

A Fabry-Perot microcavity is used for the enhancement and inhibition of photoluminescence in hydrogenated amorphous silicon nitride. The amplitude of the photoluminescence is enhanced 4 times, while its linewidth is reduced 8 times with respect to the bulk hydrogenated amorphous silicon nitride. The transmittance, reflectance, and absorptance spectra of the microcavity were also measured and calculated. The calculated spectra agree well with the experimental ones. © 1997 Optical Society of America