Operation speed of polariton condensate switches gated by excitons

• Main Authors: Antón, C., Liew, Timothy Chi Hin, Sarkar, D., Martín, M. D., Hatzopoulos, Z., Eldridge, P. S., Savvidis, P. G., Viña, L.
• Other Authors: School of Physical and Mathematical Sciences
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: 2014
• Subjects: DRNTU::Science::Physics
• Online Access: https://hdl.handle.net/10356/104982; http://hdl.handle.net/10220/20416
• Institution: Nanyang Technological University

We present a time-resolved photoluminescence (PL) study in real and momentum space of a polariton condensate switch in a quasi-one-dimensional semiconductor microcavity. The polariton flow across the ridge is gated by excitons inducing a barrier potential due to repulsive interactions. A study of the device operation dependence on the power of the pulsed gate beam obtains a satisfactory compromise for the on-off signal ratio and switching time of the order of 0.3 and ∼50 ps, respectively. The opposite transition is governed by the long-lived gate excitons, consequently, the off-on switching time is ∼200 ps, limiting the overall operation speed of the device to ∼3 GHz. The experimental results are compared to numerical simulations based on a generalized Gross-Pitaevskii equation, taking into account incoherent pumping, decay, and energy relaxation within the condensate.