Non-linear optics of hybrid excitons in organic-inorganic nanostructures.

In a system comprising an organic layer coupled to a semiconductor layer, if the energy of the Frenkel exciton in the first is dose to that of the Wannier exciton in the second, the lowest electronic excitations can be described as hybrid resonances. These new excitons give rise to very pronounced optical non-linearities because they have at the same time large oscillator strengths, typical of Frenkel excitons, and large radii, typical of Wannier excitons. The results of a microscopic calculation of the optical properties of such a system are presented and discussed: compared with the usual semiconductor quantum wells, enhancements of two orders of magnitude both in the size of the susceptibility (linear part) and in its relative change with increasing excitation density (Kerr non-linearity) are predicted