title: Dynamics of Si-H vibrations in an amorphous environment
abstract: We present results of the first vibrational photon-echo, transient-grating, and temperature dependent transient-bleaching experiments on a-Si:H. Using these techniques, and the infrared light of a free electron laser, the vibrational population decay and phase relaxation of the Si-H stretching mode were investigated. Careful analysis of the data indicates that the vibrational energy relaxes directly into Si-H bending modes and Si phonons, with a distribution of rates determined by the amorphous host. Conversely, the pure dephasing appears to be single exponential, and can be modeled by dephasing via two-phonon interactions.
authors.affiliation: Faculty of Physics and Astronomy, Debye Institute, Utrecht University, P.O. Box 80.000, 3508 TA Utrecht, The Netherlands.
authors.lastname: van Der Voort M
authors.initials: CW
authors.lastname: Rella
authors.lastname: van Der Meer LF
authors.initials: AV
authors.lastname: Akimov
authors.initials: JI
authors.lastname: Dijkhuis