Ultrafast population switching of quantum dots in a structured vacuum.

Switching dynamics and ultrafast inversion control of quantum dots for on-chip optical information processing

We demonstrate dynamical near-complete inversion switching of a two-level quantum dot driven by picosecond optical pulses in a bimodal photonic band gap PBG waveguide at microwatt power levels. This is enabled by a sharp steplike discontinuity in the local electromagnetic density of states LDOS provided by a cutoff in one of the two waveguide modes. The atomic Bloch vector equations in this col...

Ultrafast Nonlinear Optical Response in GaN/AlN Quantum Dots for Optical Switching

Quantum-dot all-optical logic in a structured vacuum

We demonstrate multiwavelength channel optical logic operations on the Bloch vector of a quantum two-level system in the structured electromagnetic vacuum of a bimodal photonic crystal waveguide. This arises through a bichromatic strong-coupling effect that enables unprecedented control over single quantum-dot (QD) excitation through two beams of ultrashort femtojoule pulses. The second driving...

Ultrafast optical switching in quantum dot-metallic nanoparticle hybrid systems.

We study ultrafast excitonic population inversion resulting from the interaction of a semiconductor quantum dot (SQD) with localized surface plasmons. The plasmonic enhanced fields are generated when a metallic nanoparticle (MNP) is subject to a nonlinear chirped few-cycle pulse train. By numerically solving the time-dependent Bloch equations beyond the rotating-wave approximation, we show that...

Ultrafast Nonlinear Optical Response in GaN/AlN Quantum Dots for Optical Switching Applications at 1.55 μm

Multi-terabit optical time division multiplexing (OTDM) networks require semiconductor all-optical switches and wavelength converters operating at room temperature. These devices should be characterized by AN ultrafast response capable of sustaining high repetition rates with low switching energy and high contrast ratio. These features lead to consider the use of resonant nonlinearities for the...