Polarization entangled photon pairs on demand are considered to be an important building block of quantum communication technology. It has been demonstrated that semiconductor quantum dots (QDs), which exhibit a certain spatial symmetry, can be used as a triggered, on-chip source of polarization entangled photon pairs. Due to limitations of the growth, the as-grown QDs usually do not exhibit the required symmetry, making the availability of post-growth tuning techniques essential. In this work first the QD-morphology of hundreds of QDs is correlated with the optical emission of neutral excitons confined in GaAs/AlGaAs QDs. It is presented how elastic anisotropic stress can be used to partially restore the symmetry of self-assembled GaAs/AlGaAs and InGaAs/GaAs QDs, making them as candidate sources of entangled photon pairs. As a consequence of the tuning of the QD-anisotropy we observe a rotation of the polarization of the emitted light. The joint modification of polarization orientation and QD anisotropy can be described by an anticrossing of the so-called bright excitonic states. Furthermore, it is demonstrated that anisotropic stress can be used to tune the purity of the hole states of the QDs by modifying the degree of heavy and light hole mixing. This ability might be interesting for applications using the hole spin as a so-called quantum bit.

Cette thèse est consacrée à l’étude expérimentale des propriétés magnéto-optiques intrinsèques des nanotubes de carbone mono-paroi par spectroscopie de photoluminescence résolue en temps.Un dispositif de microscopie optique confocale de grande ouverture numérique (NA = 0.95),incluant un cryostat magnétique, permet l’étude de nanotubes suspendus à l’échelle individuelle,à température cryogénique (jusqu’à 2 Kelvin) et sous champ magnétique (jusqu’à 7 Tesla). L’évolution des spectres et des déclins de photoluminescence avec le champ magnétique montre l’influence de l’effet Aharonov-Bohm sur les deux excitons singulets de plus basse énergie, c’est à-dire l’exciton fondamental qui est optiquement inactif (exciton noir) et un exciton d’énergie supérieure séparé de quelques milliélectronvolts qui est optiquement actif (exciton brillant). L’interprétation de ces résultats à partir d’un modèle d’équations de taux qui intègre le couplage Aharonov-Bohm entre ces deux excitons permet de déterminer séparément les durées de vie excitoniques et de fournir des informations quantitatives sur la relaxation de l’énergie depuis les niveaux supérieurs photo-excités. La relaxation de l’énergie suite à la photo-excitation de la transition S22 conduit à une efficacité de peuplement de l’état brillant quatre fois plus faible que celle de l’état noir, mais qui augmente significativement lorsque la relaxation se produit depuis les niveaux excitoniques KK’. D’autre part, le bon rapport signal à bruit obtenu dans les spectres de photoluminescence permet de révéler l’existence d’un couplage intrinsèque en champ nul entre l’exciton noir et l’exciton brillant ainsi que le maintien de la mobilité excitonique dans les nanotubes suspendus à la température de l’hélium liquide. / This thesis is dedicated to the experimental study of the intrinsic magneto-optical properties of single-walled carbon nanotubes through time-resolved photoluminescence spectroscopy. Measurements are performed on suspended nanotubes samples at the single-object level using a home-built confocal optical microscope with a large numerical aperture (NA = 0.95) operating at cryogenic temperature (down to 2K) and high magnetic field (up to 7T). The evolution of the photoluminescence spectra and decay signals with increasing magnetic fields shows the influence of the Aharonov-Bohm effect on the two lowest-energy singlet excitons, namely the ground exciton which is optically inactive (dark exciton) and an exciton lying a few millielectron volts higher in energy which is optically active (bright exciton). A model of these results based on rate equations and including the Aharonov-Bohm coupling between these two excitons enables to determine separately the excitons lifetimes and to derive quantitative information on the energy relaxation from the photo-excited higher levels. The energy relaxation following the photo-excitation of the S22 transition leads to a bright state population efficiency four times lower than that of the dark state, but it significantly increases when energy relaxation occurs from the KK’ excitonic levels. Thanks to a good signal to noise ratio, the photoluminescence spectra also reveal the presence of an intrinsic zero-field coupling between the dark and the brightexcitons, as well as an excitonic mobility preserved at liquid helium temperature in suspended nanotubes.

Polarization entangled photon pairs on demand are considered to be an important building block of quantum communication technology. It has been demonstrated that semiconductor quantum dots (QDs), which exhibit a certain spatial symmetry, can be used as a triggered, on-chip source of polarization entangled photon pairs. Due to limitations of the growth, the as-grown QDs usually do not exhibit the required symmetry, making the availability of post-growth tuning techniques essential. In this work first the QD-morphology of hundreds of QDs is correlated with the optical emission of neutral excitons confined in GaAs/AlGaAs QDs. It is presented how elastic anisotropic stress can be used to partially restore the symmetry of self-assembled GaAs/AlGaAs and InGaAs/GaAs QDs, making them as candidate sources of entangled photon pairs. As a consequence of the tuning of the QD-anisotropy we observe a rotation of the polarization of the emitted light. The joint modification of polarization orientation and QD anisotropy can be described by an anticrossing of the so-called bright excitonic states. Furthermore, it is demonstrated that anisotropic stress can be used to tune the purity of the hole states of the QDs by modifying the degree of heavy and light hole mixing. This ability might be interesting for applications using the hole spin as a so-called quantum bit.