Strong excitonic nonlinearity in a P-I-N photodiode incorporating narrow asymmetric coupled quantum wells

Strong excitonic nonlinearity in the photoconductive response of a P-I-N photodiode incorporating narrow asymmetric coupled quantum wells has been observed at 78 K. When the P-I-N photodiode is overbiased, the heavyhole energy levels in the two coupled quantum wells are moved toward the resonance by increasing the laser intensity. Also, both the light-hole and the heavy-hole excitonic transitions undergo intensity-dependent shifts. Both these effects indicate intrinsic change of bias due to redistribution of photogenerated carriers and, therefore, the existence of an intrinsic feedback mechanism. The magnitude of the blue shift of the heavy-hole excitonic transitions significantly increases when the laser intensity is changed from 9.2 to ~270 mW/cm(2).