Ultrafast Degenerate Transient Lens Spectroscopy in Semiconductor Nanosctructures

We report the non-resonant excitation and probing of the nonlinear refractive index change in bulk semiconductors and semiconductor quantum dots through degenerate transient lens spectroscopy. The signal oscillates at the center laser field frequency, and the envelope of the former in quantum dots is distinctly different from the one in bulk sample. We discuss the applicability of this technique for polarization state probing in semiconductor media with femtosecond temporal resolution.