Enhanced and inhibited spontaneous emission in GaAs/AlGaAs vertical microcavity lasers with two kinds of quantum wells

Abstract

We investigate enhanced and inhibited spontaneous emission effects in a vertical λ-microcavity structure having two kinds of quantum wells (QWs) with the thicknesses of 76 and 114 Å, measuring both photoluminescence intensity and carrier lifetime. The 76 and 114 Å QWs are placed at the maximum and at the nodes of the emitted standing wave in the microcavity, respectively. When the λ-microcavity mode is tuned to the quantized band-gap energy of the 76 Å QWs (enhanced condition), the PL intensity is enhanced compared with the case that the cavity mode is tuned to the quantized band-gap energy of the 114 Å QWs (inhibited condition). In addition, the increase of the carrier lifetime is also observed under the inhibited condition. These results demonstrate existence of enhanced and inhibited spontaneous emission effects in the microcavity structures.