Critical behavior of dissipative two-dimensional spin lattices

We explore critical properties of two-dimensional lattices of spins interacting via an anisotropic Heisenberg Hamiltonian and subject to incoherent spin flips. We determine the steady-state solution of the master equation for the density matrix via the corner-space renormalization method. We investigate the finite-size scaling and critical exponent of the magnetic linear susceptibility associated to a dissipative ferromagnetic transition. We show that the Von Neumann entropy increases across the critical point, revealing a strongly mixed character of the ferromagnetic phase. Entanglement is witnessed by the quantum Fisher information which exhibits a critical behavior at the transition point, showing that quantum correlations play a crucial role in the transition even though the system is in a mixed state.Comment: Accepted for publication on Phys. Rev. B (6 pages, 5 figures

Polariton quantum blockade in a photonic dot

We investigate the quantum nonlinear dynamics of a resonantly excited photonic quantum dot embedding a quantum well in the strong exciton-photon coupling regime. Within a master equation approach, we study the polariton quantum blockade and the generation of single photon states due to polariton-polariton interactions as a function of the photonic dot geometry, spectral linewidths and energy detuning between quantum well exciton and confined photon mode. The second order coherence function $g^{(2)}(t,t')$ is calculated for both continuous wave and pulsed excitations

Quantum squeezing generation versus photon localization in a disordered microcavity

We investigate theoretically the nonlinear dynamics induced by an intense pump field in a disordered planar microcavity. Through a self-consistent theory, we show how the generation of quantum optical noise squeezing is affected by the breaking of the in-plane translational invariance and the occurrence of photon localization. We find that the generation of single-mode Kerr squeezing for the ideal planar case can be prevented by disorder as a result of multimode nonlinear coupling, even when the other modes are in the vacuum state. However, the excess noise is a non-monotonous function of the disorder amplitude. In the strong localization limit, we show that the system becomes protected with respect to this fundamental coupling mechanism and that the ideal quadrature squeezing generation can be obtained

Ferromagnetic imprinting of spin polarization in a semiconductor

We present a theory of the imprinting of the electron spin coherence and population in an n-doped semiconductor which forms a junction with a ferromagnet. The reflection of non-equilibrium semiconductor electrons at the interface provides a mechanism to manipulate the spin polarization vector. In the case of unpolarized excitation, this ballistic effect produces spontaneous electron spin coherence and nuclear polarization in the semiconductor, as recently observed by time-resolved Faraday rotation experiments. We investigate the dependence of the spin reflection on the Schottky barrier height and the doping concentration in the semiconductor and suggest control mechanisms for possible device applications.Comment: 4 pages with 2 figure

Quantum Monte Carlo study of ring-shaped polariton parametric luminescence in a semiconductor microcavity

We present a quantum Monte Carlo study of the quantum correlations in the parametric luminescence from semiconductor microcavities in the strong exciton-photon coupling regime. As already demonstrated in recent experiments, a ring-shaped emission is obtained by applying two identical pump beams with opposite in-plane wavevectors, providing symmetrical signal and idler beams with opposite in-plane wavevectors on the ring. We study the squeezing of the signal-idler difference noise across the parametric instability threshold, accounting for the radiative and non-radiative losses, multiple scattering and static disorder. We compare the results of the complete multimode Monte Carlo simulations with a simplified linearized quantum Langevin analytical model

Quantum vacuum properties of the intersubband cavity polariton field

We present a quantum description of a planar microcavity photon mode strongly coupled to a semiconductor intersubband transition in presence of a two-dimensional electron gas. We show that, in this kind of system, the vacuum Rabi frequency $\Omega\_R$ can be a significant fraction of the intersubband transition frequency $\omega\_{12}$. This regime of ultra-strong light-matter coupling is enhanced for long wavelength transitions, because for a given doping density, effective mass and number of quantum wells, the ratio $\Omega\_R/\omega\_{12}$ increases as the square root of the intersubband emission wavelength. We characterize the quantum properties of the ground state (a two-mode squeezed vacuum), which can be tuned {\it in-situ} by changing the value of $\Omega\_R$, e.g., through an electrostatic gate. We finally point out how the tunability of the polariton quantum vacuum can be exploited to generate correlated photon pairs out of the vacuum via quantum electrodynamics phenomena reminiscent of the dynamic Casimir effect.Comment: Final version accepted in PR

Time resolved scattering relaxation mechanisms of microcavity polaritons

We study the polariton relaxation dynamics for different scattering mechanisms as: Phonon and electron scattering procesess. The relaxation polariton is obtained at very short times by solving the Boltzman equation. Instead of the well-known relaxation process by phonons, we show that the bottleneck effect relaxes to the ground state more efficiently at low pump power intensity when the electron relaxation process is included. In this way, we clearly demonstrate that different relaxation times exist, for which any of these two mechanism is more efficient to relax the polariton population to the ground state.Comment: 10 eps figure