APPLICATION OF SOLID IMMERSION LENS TO HIGH-SPATIAL-RESOLUTION PHOTOLUMINESCENCE IMAGING OF GAAS QUANTUM-WELLS AT LOW-TEMPERATURES

A solid immersion lens (SIL) was applied to microscopic photoluminesce nce (PL) imaging at low temperatures. The spatial resolution correspon ding to a numerical aperture of 1.0 was achieved and confirmed to be i ndependent of temperature from 5 to 300 K. We performed PL imaging wit h the SIL for a GaAs quantum well and obtained stable PL images with h igh-spatial resolution at a wide temperature range from 5 to 200 K. Fr om the temperature dependence of the PL images with high-spatial resol ution, we can directly reveal the diffusion of photocarriers in the sa mple, which indicates the usefulness of the SIL technique. (C) 1998 Am erican Institute of Physics.