Many-body theory for semiconductor microcavity lasers

The influence of many-body, nonequilibrium, and cavity effects on the emission characteristics and carrier dynamics of semiconductor microcavity lasers is investigated. The nonlinear coupled equations for the carrier kinetics and the laser dynamics are derived. Numerical solutions for vertical cavity surface emitting lasers show that the electron-hole plasma population has strong nonequilibrium character under many realistic conditions, exhibiting plasma heating and/or kinetic hole burning. It is shown that the desired threshold reduction through increased spontaneous emission coupling is accompanied by a significant increase in the laser linewidth and deviations from the usual Schawlow-Townes line narrowing. Assuming optical excitation with femtosecond pulses, the delayed onset of laser action and the dynamical emission characteristics are computed.