Luminescence quenching in InAs quantum dots

We report how photoluminescence from self-assembled InAs quantum dots depend on pumping power and vertical electric field. The InAs dots, which are embedded in a capacitor-like structure, act as efficient trapping centers for excitons. At a high enough electric field, however, the photoexcited electrons tunnel out of the dots fast enough to quench the emission. For samples with two adjacent layers of vertically aligned dots, we find that the threshold voltage for quenching depends very strongly on the optical pumping power. In total contrast to this, we find no comparable effect for samples grown with a single layer of dots. We explain this in terms of efficient storage of electrons and holes in the double-layer samples. (C) 2001 American Institute of Physics.