Collective coherence in planar semiconductor microcavities

TL;DR

This paper reviews experimental and theoretical advances in understanding collective coherence, lasing, and condensation phenomena in semiconductor microcavities with exciton-polariton modes, highlighting different pumping regimes and models.

Contribution

It provides a comprehensive overview of recent progress and theoretical frameworks for collective coherence in planar semiconductor microcavities.

Findings

Experimental evidence of spontaneous coherence

Theoretical models explaining coherence phenomena

Analysis of different pumping regimes

Abstract

Semiconductor microcavities, in which strong coupling of excitons to confined photon modes leads to the formation of exciton-polariton modes, have increasingly become a focus for the study of spontaneous coherence, lasing, and condensation in solid state systems. This review discusses the significant experimental progress to date, the phenomena associated with coherence which have been observed, and also discusses in some detail the different theoretical models that have been used to study such systems. We consider both the case of non-resonant pumping, in which coherence may spontaneously arise, and the related topics of resonant pumping, and the optical parametric oscillator.