Influence of Carrier Cooling on the Emission Dynamics of Semiconductor Microcavity Lasers

We investigate the influence of carrier relaxation on the emission dynamics of a semiconductor microcavity laser. The structure is optically excited with energies of 1.477 down to 1.346 eV (resonant excitation). The stimulated emission dynamics clearly becomes faster for decreasing excitation energy and the influence of the light hole on the emission dynamics is demonstrated. Theoretical calculations reproduce the results only if the nonequilibrium carrier dynamics is treated on the basis of a microscopic model.