The optical selection rules in epitaxial quantum dots are strongly influenced by the orientation of their natural quantization axis, which is usually parallel to the growth direction. This configuration is well suited for vertically emitting devices, but not for planar photonic circuits because of the poorly controlled orientation of the transition dipoles in the growth plane. Here we show that the quantization axis of gallium arsenide dots can be flipped into the growth plane via moderate in-plane uniaxial stress. By using piezoelectric strain-actuators featuring strain amplification, we study the evolution of the selection rules and excitonic fine structure in a regime, in which quantum confinement can be regarded as a perturbation compared to strain in determining the symmetry-properties of the system. The experimental and computational results suggest that uniaxial stress may be the right tool to obtain quantum-light sources with ideally oriented transition dipoles and enhanced oscillator strengths for integrated quantum photonics.

Central European Institute of Technology Brno University of Technology Purkyňova 123 61200 Brno Czech Republic

Departamento de Física Universidad de Oviedo 33007 Oviedo Spain

Department of Physics Sapienza University of Rome Piazzale Aldo Moro 5 00185 Rome Italy

Forschungszentrum Mikrotechnik FH Vorarlberg Hochschulstraße 1 6850 Dornbirn Austria

Hefei National Laboratory for Physical Sciences at Microscale University of Science and Technology of China Shanghai Branch Xiupu Road 99 201315 Shanghai China

Institut für Physikalische Chemie Universität Hamburg Grindelallee 117 20146 Hamburg Germany

Institute for Integrative Nanosciences IFW Dresden Helmholtzstraße 20 01069 Dresden Germany

Institute of Semiconductor and Solid State Physics Johannes Kepler University Linz Altenbergerstraße 69 4040 Linz Austria

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