Self-excited luminescence in GaAs

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Abstract
A certain fraction of the photon flux absorbed within the passive bulk of a GaAs photosource results in the creation of further photons. It is the subject of this report to measure the fraction of internal absorption events that do result in the further generation of spontaneous photons at band‐edge energy in GaAs. The luminescence described here is a special case of photoluminescence where the source excitation is the same energy range as the resulting generation. We have chosen to call this special case self‐excited luminescence (SEL). Measurements using cross‐ and parallel‐axis polarizer pairs are used to measure SEL quantum efficiency. Most GaAs samples tested indicate an SEL efficiency of less than 1% at 300°K. As a check on experimental precision, the photopeak energy of the source excitation was increased by approximately 0.04 eV and the quantum efficiency for the resulting internal luminescence increased to 3.3% at 300°K for one sample.