Terahertz-induced optical emission of photoexcited undoped GaAs quantum wells.

Intense terahertz (THz) pulse induces photoluminescence (PL) flash from undoped high-quality GaAs/AlGaAs quantum wells under continuous wave laser excitation. The number of excitons increases 10,000-fold from that of the steady state under only laser excitation. The THz electric field dependence and the relaxation dynamics of the PL flash intensity suggest that the strong electric field of the THz pulse ionizes impurity states during the 1 ps period of the THz pulse and release carriers from a giant reservoir containing impurity states in the AlGaAs layers.