Ultrafast dynamics and mechanisms of non-stationary absorption in thin gallium selenide samples

Abstract

Herein, the dynamics and mechanisms of induced absorption in thin samples of gallium selenide under various excitation conditions are studied using femtosecond kinetic spectroscopy. We have registered several types of induced changes including induced absorption on free charge carriers (“hot” and thermalized electrons), bleaching and absorption due to the population of near-edge trap or exciton states, as well as rapid changes in the absorption of probing radiation in the region of the overlap of the exciting and probing pulses due to two-quantum two-frequency interband transitions. The time ranges of the relaxation processes are estimated. It is shown that when using relatively low-intensity long-wave excitation (790 nm), the resonant excitation of the near-edge states occurs mainly due to two-quantum two-frequency transitions followed by the formation of the dynamic equilibrium between bound and free electrons in the time range up to 5 ps. When electrons are excited deeply into the conduction band with the formation of hot free electrons and their subsequent thermalization to the bottom of the conduction band in the time range up to 1 ps, the population of the near-edge states and the establishment of the dynamic equilibrium between bound and free electrons is realized in the same time range (5 ps) as when they are excited “from below”.