Raman cooling of solids through photonic density of states engineering

The laser cooling of vibrational states of solids has been achieved through photoluminescence in rare-earth elements, optical forces in optomechanics, and Brillouin scattering light–sound interaction. The net cooling of solids through spontaneous Raman scattering and the laser refrigeration of indirect band gap semiconductors both remain unsolved challenges. Here, we show analytically that photonic density of states (DoS) engineering can address the two fundamental requirements for achieving spontaneous Raman cooling: suppressing the dominance of Stokes (heating) transitions and the enhancement of anti-Stokes (cooling) efficiency beyond the natural optical absorption of the material. We develop a general model for the DoS modification to spontaneous Raman scattering probabilities, and elucidate the necessary and minimum condition required for achieving net Raman cooling. With a suitably engineered DoS, we establish the enticing possibility of the refrigeration of intrinsic silicon by annihilating phonons from all its Ramanactive modes simultaneously, through a single telecom wavelength pump. This result points to a highly flexible approach for the laser cooling of any transparent semiconductor, including indirect band gap semiconductors, far away from significant optical absorption, band-edge states, excitons, or atomic resonances.