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Electrically pumped terahertz laser based on a topological insulator quantum dot array

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Abstract

The energy level separation between the edge states in topological insulator quantum dots lies in the terahertz (THz) range. Quantum confinement ensures the nonuniformity of the energy level separation near the Dirac point. Based on these features, we propose that a topological insulator quantum dot array can be operated as an electrically pumped continuous-wave THz laser. The proposed device can operate at room temperature, with power exceeding 10 mW and quantum efficiency reaching ∼50%. This study may promote the usage of topological insulator quantum dots as an important source of THz radiation.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. State Key Laboratory for Superlattices and Microstructures, Institute of Semiconductors, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, 100083, China

    YongWei Huang, LiKun Shi, WenKai Lou & Kai Chang

  2. CAS Center for Excellence in Topological Quantum Computation, University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, 100190, China

    YongWei Huang, WenKai Lou & Kai Chang

  3. Department of Physics, Semiconductor Photonics Research Center, Xiamen University, Xiamen, 361005, China

    Jun Li

  4. Beijing Academy of Quantum Information Sciences, Beijing, 100193, China

    HuiHong Yuan & Kai Chang

  5. Beijing Computational Science Research Center, Beijing, 100193, China

    Wen Yang

Authors
  1. YongWei Huang
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  2. LiKun Shi
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  3. Jun Li
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  4. WenKai Lou
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  5. HuiHong Yuan
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  6. Wen Yang
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  7. Kai Chang
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Corresponding authors

Correspondence to Wen Yang or Kai Chang.

Additional information

This work was supported by the Strategic Priority Research Program of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (Grant No. XDB28000000), the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant Nos. 61674145, 11974340, 11434010, 11574303, and 11774021), the Ministry of Science and Technology of the People’s Republic of China (Grant Nos. 2018YFA0306101, and 2017YFA0303400), the Chinese Academy of Sciences (Grant No. QYZDJ-SSW-SYS001, and XXH13506-202), and the NSFC program for the “Scientific Research Center” (Grant No. U1930402).

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Huang, Y., Shi, L., Li, J. et al. Electrically pumped terahertz laser based on a topological insulator quantum dot array. Sci. China Phys. Mech. Astron. 64, 217211 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11433-020-1604-2

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11433-020-1604-2

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