Electronic energy transfer in a microcavity

We study the microcavity effect on energy transfer via the electromagnetic field. The modification of the optical propel ties of the microcavity due to the presence of absorbing accepters is taken into account. We analyze different cases that may be realized depending on the characteristics of the acceptor absorption band: the case of strong and broad absorption, when the cavity mode is practically destroyed; the regime of weak absorption, when the cavity mode is still well defined and just acquires some additional broadening; and the strong-coupling regime, when the acceptor absorption has the shape of a strong and narrow peak and two polariton branches appear, formed due to coherent mixing of the acceptor excitations and the cavity mode. In our calculations we use a realistic model for the cavity mirrors (dielectric or metallic), which is important since the mirrors introduce an additional decay channel for the donor excitation besides the transfer to the accepters. The distribution of the energy between different decay channels is analyzed in detail.