Intersubband polaritons with spin-orbit interaction

We investigate intersubband polaritons formed in the asymmetric quantum well (AQW) embedded into the semiconductor microcavity and study the effects of spin-orbit interaction (SOI) acting on intersubband excitations. The spin-orbit interaction of Rashba and Dresselhaus type remove the spin degeneracy of electrons with finite value of in-plane momentum and allow four types of intersubband excitations. While optical spin-flip transitions are suppressed, the spectrum of elementary excitations shows the appearance of upper, lower and middle polaritonic branches based on spin-conserving transitions. The accounting of finite photon momentum leads to non-zero average spin projection of electronic ensemble in the first excited subband under cw excitation for both isotropic (Rashba) and anisotropic (Rashba and Dresselhaus) SOI. We predict the possibility of spin current generation in the considered systems with long coherence length.Comment: 9 pages, 8 figure

THz laser based on dipolaritons

We develop the microscopic theory of a terahertz (THz) laser based on the effects of resonant tunneling in a double quantum well heterostructure embedded in both optical and THz cavities. In the strong coupling regime the system hosts dipolaritons, hybrid quasiparticles formed by the direct exciton, indirect exciton and optical photon, which possess large dipole moments in the growth direction. Their radiative coupling to the mode of a THz cavity combined with strong non-linearities provided by exciton-exciton interactions allows for stable emission of THz radiation in the regime of the continuous optical excitation. The optimal parameters for maximizing the THz signal output power are analyzed.Comment: 8 pages, 7 figure

Impact of high-frequency pumping on anomalous finite-size effects in three-dimensional topological insulators

Lowering of the thickness of a thin-film three-dimensional topological insulator down to a few nanometers results in the gap opening in the spectrum of topologically protected two-dimensional surface states. This phenomenon, which is referred to as the anomalous finite-size effect, originates from hybridization between the states propagating along the opposite boundaries. In this work, we consider a bismuth-based topological insulator and show how the coupling to an intense high-frequency linearly polarized pumping can further be used to manipulate the value of a gap. We address this effect within recently proposed Brillouin-Wigner perturbation theory that allows us to map a time-dependent problem into a stationary one. Our analysis reveals that both the gap and the components of the group velocity of the surface states can be tuned in a controllable fashion by adjusting the intensity of the driving field within an experimentally accessible range and demonstrate the effect of light-induced band inversion in the spectrum of the surface states for high enough values of the pump.Comment: 6 pages, 3 figure

Superradiant terahertz emission by dipolaritons

Dipolaritons are mixed light-matter quasiparticles formed in double quantum wells embedded in microcavities. Due to resonant coupling between direct and indirect excitons via electronic tunnelling, dipolaritons possess large dipole moments. Resonant excitation of the cavity mode by a short pulse of light induces oscillations of the indirect exciton density with a characteristic frequency of Rabi flopping. This results in oscillations of classical Hertz dipoles array which generate supperradiant emission on a terahertz (THz) frequency. Resulting THz signal may be enhanced using the supplementary THz cavity in the weak coupling regime.Comment: 5+10 pages, 3+5 figures; close to printed version, to appear in Phys. Rev. Let

Functional renormalization group approach to the singlet-triplet transition in quantum dots

We present a functional renormalization group approach to the zero bias transport properties of a quantum dot with two different orbitals and in presence of Hund's coupling. Tuning the energy separation of the orbital states, the quantum dot can be driven through a singlet-triplet transition. Our approach, based on the approach by Karrasch {\em et al} which we apply to spin-dependent interactions, recovers the key characteristics of the quantum dot transport properties with very little numerical effort. We present results on the conductance in the vicinity of the transition and compare our results both with previous numerical renormalization group results and with predictions of the perturbative renormalization group.Comment: 15 pages, 9 figure

Spin-orbit coupled cold exciton condensates

We analyze theoretically the dynamics of degenerate condensate of cold indirect excitons. We account for both linear spin dependent terms arising from spin-orbit interaction of Rashba and Dresselhaus types and non-linear terms transforming a pair of bright excitons into a pair of dark ones. We show that both terms should lead to the qualitative changes in the dynamics of cold exciton droplets in the real space and time.Comment: 14 pages, 7 figure