Superfluorescent laser sources based on single-wall carbon nanotube films (Conference Presentation)

High-quality thin films of highly aligned semiconducting single-wall carbon nanotubes have been recently demonstrated. They have excellent absorption and photoluminescence properties; however, fast nonradiative recombination of carriers prevents their use as a gain medium in lasers. Here we predict that such films can operate as efficient sources of ultrashort radiation pulses under the conditions of superfluorescence, i.e. cooperative interband recombination of injected electrons and holes. Superfluorescence develops much faster than nonradiative recombination and leads to high-intensity, coherent pulses of near/mid-infrared radiation.