Correlations between cascaded photons from spatially localized biexcitons in ZnSe

TL;DR

This paper demonstrates a radiative cascade from biexciton decay at impurity atoms in ZnSe quantum wells, showing potential for entangled photon sources in quantum technologies.

Contribution

It introduces impurity atoms in ZnSe as a new platform for radiative cascades and entangled photon generation in semiconductor quantum wells.

Findings

Photon pairs exhibit clear temporal correlations.

The cascade demonstrates time-ordering of emitted photons.

Impurity atoms in ZnSe can serve as quantum light sources.

Abstract

Radiative cascades emit correlated photon pairs, providing a pathway for the generation of entangled photons. The realization of a radiative cascade with impurity atoms in semiconductors, a leading platform for the generation of quantum light, would therefore provide a new avenue for the development of entangled photon pair sources. Here we demonstrate a radiative cascade from the decay of a biexciton at an impurity-atom complex in a ZnSe quantum well. The emitted photons show clear temporal correlations revealing the time--ordering of the cascade. Our result establishes impurity atoms in ZnSe as a potential platform for photonic quantum technologies using radiative cascades.