Rare Gas Precipitates in Metals as Quantum Dots for the Polaritons

Energy spectra of the size quantization of excitons in Xe, Kr, Ar and Ne precipitates in Al and their manifestation in reflection spectra are calculated taking into account polariton effects (dipole-dipole exciton interactions), spatial dispersion and mixing of the electronic excitations of the inclusion with collective excitations of the surrounding metal (plasmons). It was shown that: 1) the proximity of energies of the exciton levels and the plasmons localized on the inclusion (surface plasmons) results in the gigantic shift (up to 1 eV) of the levels of coupled excitations, 2) the transfer of the oscillator strength from the plasmon level to the exciton levels leads to the amplification of optical transitions in bubbles by several orders of magnitude. Depending on the position of the surface polariton with respect to the surface plasmon the spectra either show additional broadenning due to the coupling with quantized exciton levels (Ar, Ne) or the polariton level is pushed out of the exciton band and manifests itself as a narrow dip in the reflection spectra.