Nonlinear Coherent Optical Effects in Semiconductors

The resonant illumination by coherent optical radiation of an electronic excitation creates a quantum mechanical coherent superposition of the initial and final states of the transition. The nonlinear optical properties of this state can be used to provide a sensitive measurement of many fundamental parameters of the material including transport, elastic and inelastic scattering, energy level splittings between nearly degenerate states, energy relaxation, as well as associated information such as Lande g-factors, the degree of state mixing and symmetry.