Binding energies of indirect excitons in double quantum well systems

A prerequisite towards Bose-Einstein condensation is a cold and dense system of bosons. Indirect excitons in double GaAs/AlGaAs quantum wells (DQWs) are believed to be suitable candidates. Indirect excitons are formed in asymmetric DQW structures by mass filtering, a method which does not require external electric fields. The exciton density and the electron-hole balance can be tuned optically. Binding energies are measured by a resonant microwave absorption technique. Our results show that screening of the indirect excitons becomes already relevant at densities as low as ~5$\times$10$^{9}$cm$^{-2}$ and results in their destruction.