Excitons and microcavity polaritons that possess a macroscopic dipole alignment are attractive systems to study. This is due to an enhancement of collective many body effects and an ability to electrostatically control their transport and internal structure. Here, we present an overview of a rigorous calculation of spatially-indirect exciton states in semiconductor coupled quantum wells in externally applied electric and magnetic fields. We also treat dipolaritons that form when such structures are positioned at the antinode of a resonant cavity mode. Our approach is general and can be applied to various planar solid state heterostructures inside optical resonators. It offers a thorough description of the properties of excitons and polaritons that are important for modelling their respective fluids. In particular, we calculate the exciton Bohr radius, binding energy, optical lifetime and magnetic field induced enhancement of the effective mass. We also describe electric and magnetic field control of the exciton and polariton dipole moment and brightness.

Research results using these data are published at http://doi.org/10.1016/j.spmi.2017.01.027