Polariton dynamics in disordered microcavities

The behaviour of cavity polaritons is strongly affected by disorder scattering in traditional inorganic semiconductor microcavities and, much more, in organic semiconductor microcavities. In the presence of disorder coherent cavity polaritons having a well defined in-plane wavevector coexist with incoherent states having a localized character. We here study through a numerical simulation of a one-dimensional disordered microcavity in the strong coupling regime, the polariton wavefunction character and the dynamical behaviour of excited wave packets. A detailed microscopic picture is obtained which substantiates the coexistence of both propagating and localized states over time and length scales of experimental relevance. (C) 2007 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.