Self-pulsing driven by two-photon absorption in semiconductor nanocavities

Abstract

We show that a semiconductor nanocavity where the dominant nonlinear mechanism is the refractive index change induced by carriers generated through two-photon absorption can become unstable, exhibiting the onset of spontaneous oscillations (self-pulsing). The linear stability analysis, validated through numerical integration of a mean-field model, leads us to predict oscillations to take place typically in the 10-ps range at input power levels of the order of 15 mW.