Abstract

Spontaneous and stimulated emission properties of electronic states depend intimately on the electromagnetic environment to which they are coupled. Microcavities are of great fundamental and practical interest largely thanks to their ability to influence these emission properties. In the weak coupling regime of cavity quantum electrodynamics, a microcavity can either enhance or inhibit spontaneous emission, while the strong coupling regime is characterized by reversible vacuum Rabi oscillations. Stimulated emission properties are also greatly influenced by the nature of the intracavity field.

© 1997 Optical Society of America