We present a theory of hyper-Raman scattering in semiconductors. The theory provides a microscopic description of this process intimately tied to the quantization of the electromagnetic field. The exciton-photon coupling is treated nonperturbatively to include polariton effects and the Coulomb interaction between electrons is treated beyond the Hartree-Fock approximation of semiconductor Bloch equations. The theory demonstrates the role of the quantum-mechanical zero-point motion of excitons in the optical decay of the virtually excited biexcitons into two final polaritons or a longitudinal exciton and a polariton. We calculate the steady-state emission spectrum and present numerical results for CuCl.

• Received 4 February 1998

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevB.59.15409