Issue 22, 2023

Photon bunching in cathodoluminescence induced by indirect electron excitation

Abstract

The impulsive excitation of ensembles of excitons or color centers by a high-energy electron beam results in the observation of photon bunching in the second-order correlation function of the cathodoluminescence generated by those emitters. Photon bunching in cathodoluminescence microscopy can be used to resolve the excited-state dynamics and the excitation and emission efficiency of nanoscale materials, and it can be used to probe interactions between emitters and nanophotonic cavities. Unfortunately, the required integration times for these measurements can be problematic for beam-sensitive materials. Here, we report substantial changes in the measured bunching induced by indirect electron interactions (with indirect electron excitation inducing g2(0) values approaching 104). This result is critical to the interpretation of g2(τ) in cathodoluminescence microscopies, and, more importantly, it provides a foundation for the nanoscale characterization of optical properties in beam-sensitive materials.

Graphical abstract: Photon bunching in cathodoluminescence induced by indirect electron excitation

Supplementary files

Article information

Article type
Paper
Submitted
25 Jan 2023
Accepted
15 May 2023
First published
16 May 2023
This article is Open Access
Creative Commons BY license

Nanoscale, 2023,15, 9738-9744

Photon bunching in cathodoluminescence induced by indirect electron excitation

V. Iyer, K. Roccapriore, J. Ng, B. Srijanto, D. Lingerfelt and B. Lawrie, Nanoscale, 2023, 15, 9738 DOI: 10.1039/D3NR00376K

This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported Licence. You can use material from this article in other publications without requesting further permissions from the RSC, provided that the correct acknowledgement is given.

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