Lifetime of sub-THz coherent acoustic phonons in a GaAs-AlAs superlattice

We measure the lifetime of the zone-center 340 GHz longitudinal phonon mode in a GaAs-AlAs superlattice excited and probed with femtosecond laser pulses. By comparing measurements conducted at room temperature and liquid nitrogen temperature, we separate the intrinsic (phonon-phonon scattering) and...

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Bibliographic Details
Main Authors: Maznev, Alexei, Hofmann, Felix, Jandl, Adam Christopher, Esfarjani, Keivan, Bulsara, Mayank, Fitzgerald, Eugene A., Chen, Gang, Nelson, Keith Adam
Other Authors: Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Materials Processing Center
Format: Article
Language:en_US
Published: American Institute of Physics (AIP) 2013
Online Access:http://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/78357
https://orcid.org/0000-0002-1891-1959
https://orcid.org/0000-0002-3968-8530
https://orcid.org/0000-0001-7804-5418
Description
Summary:We measure the lifetime of the zone-center 340 GHz longitudinal phonon mode in a GaAs-AlAs superlattice excited and probed with femtosecond laser pulses. By comparing measurements conducted at room temperature and liquid nitrogen temperature, we separate the intrinsic (phonon-phonon scattering) and extrinsic contributions to phonon relaxation. The estimated room temperature intrinsic lifetime of 0.95 ns is compared to available calculations and experimental data for bulk GaAs. We conclude that ∼0.3 THz phonons are in the transition zone between Akhiezer and Landau-Rumer regimes of phonon-phonon relaxation at room temperature.