Highly Effective Polarized Electron Sources Based on Strained Semiconductor Superlattice with Distributed Bragg Reflector

Resonance enhancement of the quantum efficiency of new polarized electron photocathodes based on a short-period strained superlattice structures is reported. The superlattice is a part of an integrated Fabry-Perot optical cavity. We demonstrate that the Fabry-Perot resonator enhances the quantum efficiency by the order of magnitude in the wavelength region of the main polarization maximum. The high structural quality implied by these results points to the very promising application of these photocathodes for spin-polarized electron sources.