The semiconductor luminescence equations (SLEs)[1][2] describe luminescence of semiconductors resulting from spontaneous recombination of electronic excitations, producing a flux of spontaneously emitted light. This description established the first step toward semiconductor quantum optics because the SLEs simultaneously includes the quantized light–matter interaction and the Coulomb-interaction coupling among electronic excitations within a semiconductor. The SLEs are one of the most accurate methods to describe light emission in semiconductors and they are suited for a systematic modeling of semiconductor emission ranging from excitonic luminescence to lasers.
Due to randomness of the vacuum-field fluctuations, semiconductor luminescence is incoherent whereas the extensions of the SLEs include[2] the possibility to study resonance fluorescence resulting from optical pumping with coherent laser light. At this level, one is often interested to control and access higher-order photon-correlation effects, distinct many-body states, as well as light–semiconductor entanglement. Such investigations are the basis of realizing and developing the field of quantum-optical spectroscopy which is a branch of quantum optics.
- ^ Kira, M.; Jahnke, F.; Koch, S.; Berger, J.; Wick, D.; Nelson, T.; Khitrova, G.; Gibbs, H. (1997). "Quantum Theory of Nonlinear Semiconductor Microcavity Luminescence Explaining "Boser" Experiments". Physical Review Letters 79 (25): 5170–5173. doi:10.1103/PhysRevLett.79.5170
- ^ a b Kira, M.; Koch, S. W. (2011). Semiconductor Quantum Optics. Cambridge University Press. ISBN 978-0521875097.