Spatially Resolved Spectroscopy of Semiconductor Nanostructure Disorder

Manufacturing processes unintentionally introduce inhomogeneities, typically on the order of a few monolayers, in the width of semiconductor quantum wells. These fluctuations, known as disorder, modulate optical transition energies of excitons confined within the quantum well layer and are the main cause of inhomogeneous spectral broadening. It is therefore imperative to quantify this disorder so its effect on exciton confinement potentials can be accounted for in ultrafast spectroscopic studies on semiconductor quantum wells. We present the use of micro-photoluminescence spectroscopy to accomplish this goal, and preliminary reults of our study.