Biexcitonic photocurrent induced by two-photon process at a telecommunication band

We report on photocurrent (PC) measurements of biexciton in a single self-assembled InAs quantum dot (QD) at a telecommunication wavelength of 1.3μm. We use shadow mask technique on an n-i Schottky photodiode structure with QDs to excite a single QD resonantly. Coherent pulse excitation is realized in two types of setups utilizing (i) an optical parametric oscillator and (ii) a stable semiconductor laser diode. In both setups we observe the biexcitonic PC peaks induced by a coherent two-photon process. Especially in the latter setups, the narrower pulse linewidth in energy provides a clearer biexcitonic PC peak because of reduced unwanted excitation. We estimate the binding energy ΔEB of our telecom-band biexciton to be 0.9 meV from the splitting between excitonic and biexcitonic resonances. The result suggests our telecom-band exciton-biexciton system is a good candidate for the building block of fiber-based controlled-rotation quantum logic operation. (copyright 2009 WILEY-VCH Verlag GmbH and Co. KGaA, Weinheim) (orig.)