Nonlinear terahertz properties of n-type quantum-well heterostructures

Author

Batista, Adriano A. ; Tamborenea, P.I. ; Birnir, Bjorn ; Citrin, D.S.

Author_Institution

Sch. of Electr. & Comput. Eng., Georgia Inst. of Technol., Atlanta, GA, USA

Volume

8

Issue

3

fYear

2002

Firstpage

464

Lastpage

473

Abstract

In this letter, we study the effect of many body interactions on the collective response of confined electrons in doped quantum-well (QW) heterostructures to intense far-infrared radiation. Absorption lineshapes are computed both by numerically integrating the equations of motion and by using the appropriately time-averaged equations. For a two-subband double-QW system optical bistability is observed and its parameter range is given. For an asymmetric triple-QW structure driven at ω≈E₂-E₀ Hopf bifurcations occur which generate a strong response at a frequency incommensurate with the drive frequency or any natural frequency of the system

Keywords

III-V semiconductors; Runge-Kutta methods; absorption coefficients; aluminium compounds; bifurcation; electroabsorption; gallium arsenide; optical bistability; optical harmonic generation; semiconductor quantum wells; Coulomb interaction; GaAs-AlGaAs; Hopf bifurcations; absorption lineshapes; asymmetric triple-QW structure; collective response; confined electrons; density-matrix equations; depolarization shift terms; doped quantum-well; equations of motion; far-infrared intersubband transitions; fourth-order Runge-Kutta method; incommensurate frequency; intense far-infrared radiation; many body interactions; n-type quantum-well heterostructures; nonlinear filter; nonlinear terahertz properties; optical bistability; superharmonic generation; time-averaged equations; time-dependent Hartree approximation; two-subband system; Absorption; Bifurcation; Distortion measurement; Electrons; Extraterrestrial measurements; Finite impulse response filter; Frequency response; Optical bistability; Optical tuning; Quantum wells;

fLanguage

English

Journal_Title

Selected Topics in Quantum Electronics, IEEE Journal of

Publisher

ieee

ISSN

1077-260X

Type

jour

DOI

10.1109/JSTQE.2002.1016349

Filename

1016349