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Electrically Pumped Photonic Crystal Distributed Feedback Quantum Cascade Lasers

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 February 2011

Manijeh Razeghi ,
Yanbo Bai ,
Steven Slivken  and
Wei Zhang
Manijeh Razeghi
Affiliation:
razeghi@eecs.northwestern.edu, Northwestern University, Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, Center for Quantum Devices, 2220 Campus Drive, Evanston, IL, 60208, United States, (847) 491-7251, (847) 467-1817
Yanbo Bai
Affiliation:
y-bai@northwestern.edu, Northwestern University, Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, Center for Quantum Devices, 2220 Campus Drive, Evanston, IL, 60208, United States
Steven Slivken
Affiliation:
s-slivken@northwestern.edu, Northwestern University, Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, Center for Quantum Devices, 2220 Campus Drive, Evanston, IL, 60208, United States
Wei Zhang
Affiliation:
weizhang@northwestern.edu, Northwestern University, Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, Center for Quantum Devices, 2220 Campus Drive, Evanston, IL, 60208, United States
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Abstract

In parallel with the effort to improve the efficiency of Quantum cascade lasers (QCL) for high power continuous wave (CW) operations, the peak power in pulsed mode operation can be easily scaled up with larger emitting volumes, i.e., processing QCLs into broad area lasers. However, as the emitter width increases, multi-mode operation happens due to poorer lateral mode distinguishability. By putting a two dimensional photonic crystal distributed feedback (PCDFB) layer evanescently coupled to the main optical mode, both longitudinal and lateral beam coherence can be greatly enhanced, which makes single mode operation possible for broad area devices. For PCDFB laser performance, the linewidth enhancement factor (LEF) plays an important role in controlling the optical coherence. Being intersubband devices, QCLs have an intrinsically small LEF, thus serves better candidates over interband lasers for PCDFB applications. We demonstrate electrically pumped, room temperature, single mode operation of photonic crystal distributed feedback quantum cascade lasers emitting at λ ∼ 4.75 μm. Ridge waveguides of 50 μm and 100 μm width were fabricated with both PCDFB and Fabry-Perot feedback mechanisms. The Fabry-Perot device has a broad emitting spectrum and a broad far-field character. The PCDFB devices have primarily a single spectral mode and a diffraction limited far field characteristic with a full angular width at half-maximum of 4.8 degrees and 2.4 degrees for the 50 μm and 100 μm ridge widths, respectively.

Keywords

laseropticalIII-V
Type
Research Article
Information
MRS Online Proceedings Library (OPL) , Volume 1076: Symposium K – Materials and Devices for Laser Remote Sensing and Optical Communication , 2008 , 1076-K07-01
Copyright
Copyright © Materials Research Society 2008

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References

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