Single-mode tuneable laser operation of hybrid microcavities based on CdSe/CdS core/shell colloidal nanorods on silica microspheres

Colloidal core/shell semiconductor nanonorystals have generated a great deal of interest as gain media in recent years due to a number of salient properties originating from their small size and the associated quantum confinement [1]. These include low-threshold and temperature-insensitive lasing, reduced trapping of excited carriers, and the possibility to alleviate non-radiative Auger recombination by engineering the wavefunction distributions of the electrons, and holes within their volume. Here, single-mode, tuneable operation of fiber-coupled hybrid lasers based on colloidal CdSe/CdS core/shell nanorods on silica microspheres is reported

Optically Controlled Excitonic Transistor

Optical control of exciton fluxes is realized for indirect excitons in a crossed-ramp excitonic device. The device demonstrates experimental proof of principle for all-optical excitonic transistors with a high ratio between the excitonic signal at the optical drain and the excitonic signal due to the optical gate. The device also demonstrates experimental proof of principle for all-optical excitonic routers

Photonic transistor and router using a single quantum-dotconfined spin in a single-sided optical microcavity

The future Internet is very likely the mixture of all-optical Internet with low power consumption and quantum Internet with absolute security guaranteed by the laws of quantum mechanics. Photons would be used for processing, routing and com-munication of data, and photonic transistor using a weak light to control a strong light is the core component as an optical analogue to the electronic transistor that forms the basis of modern electronics. In sharp contrast to previous all-optical tran-sistors which are all based on optical nonlinearities, here I introduce a novel design for a high-gain and high-speed (up to terahertz) photonic transistor and its counterpart in the quantum limit, i.e., single-photon transistor based on a linear optical effect: giant Faraday rotation induced by a single electronic spin in a single-sided optical microcavity. A single-photon or classical optical pulse as the gate sets the spin state via projective measurement and controls the polarization of a strong light to open/block the photonic channel. Due to the duality as quantum gate for quantum information processing and transistor for optical information processing, this versatile spin-cavity quantum transistor provides a solid-state platform ideal for all-optical networks and quantum networks

Hybrid lasers based on CdSe/CdS core/shell colloidal quantum rods on silica microspheres

Single-mode lasing at ~628 nm above an absorbed pump power threshold of 67.5 µW, tunable within a 2.1 nm range (30% of the free-spectral-range) was obtained from colloidal CdSe/CdS core/shell nanorods on whispering-gallery-mode silica microspheres

Detection of ultra-low refractive index variations with colloidal nanoprobes

We implement a simple and fast technique to detect spectral shifts in the light scattering of gold nanoparticles due to refractive index changes of the surrounding medium. Spectral shifts are detected using spectrally balanced photon counting from the scattering spectrum of colloidal gold nanoparticles. We demonstrate the use of this technique for sensing ethanol concentration down to 0.1 M

Resonance energy transfer from PbS colloidal quantum dots to bulk silicon: the road to hybrid photovoltaics

Semiconductor Quantum Dots (QDs) are promising materials for photovoltaic applications because they can be engineered to absorb light from visible to near infrared and single absorbed photons can generate multiple excitons. However, these materials suffer from low carrier mobility, which severely limits the prospects of efficient charge extraction and carrier transport. We take advantage of the optical properties of QDs and overcome their drawback by using a hybrid photovoltaic device. This photovoltaic configuration exploits the absorption of solar photons in the QDs and the transfer of excitons from the QDs to a silicon p-n junction. We study the Resonance Energy Transfer (RET) mechanism to inject excitons from the QDs into the depletion layer of a silicon p-n junction. Lead sulphide (PbS) nanocrystals are deposited onto the silicon substrate and the efficiency of Resonance Energy Transfer (RET) from the PbS nanoparticles to bulk silicon is investigated. We study the efficiency of this transfer channel between the PbS nanocrystals and silicon by varying their separation distance. These results demonstrate RET from colloidal quantum dots to bulk silicon. Temperature measurements are also presented and show that the RET efficiency is as high as 44% at room temperature. Such a hybrid photovoltaic device makes a potentially inexpensive scheme for achieving high-efficiency and low-cost solar-cell platforms