| 1. |
- Haglund, Åsa, 1976, et al.
(författare)
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GaN-based VCSELs
- 2015
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Ingår i: VI Workshop on Physics and Technology of Semiconductor Lasers.
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Konferensbidrag (refereegranskat)abstract
- The Vertical-Cavity Surface-Emitting Laser (VCSEL) is an established optical source in short-distance optical communication links, computer mice and tailored infrared power heating systems. Its low power consumption, easy integration into two-dimensional arrays, and low-cost manufacturing also make this type of semiconductor laser suitable for application in areas such as high-resolution printing, bio-medical and general lighting. However, these applications require emission wavelengths in the blue-UV instead of the established infrared regime, which can be achieved by using GaN-based instead of GaAs-based materials. The development of GaN-based VCSELs have shown to be challenging, and so far only a handful research groups have demonstrated lasing from such electrically pumped devices [1-6]. The presented performance is typically orders of magnitudes lower compared to that from electrically driven GaAs-based VCSELs. Some of the challenges are to achieve efficient transverse current spreading, transverse optical mode confinement, high-reflectivity mirrors and resonator length control. This talk will summarize the different strategies to solve these issues in electrically pumped GaN-VCSELs together with state-of-the-art results. We will highlight our work on combined transverse current and optical mode confinement, where we show that many structures used for current confinement result in unintentionally optically anti-guided resonators. Such resonators can have a very high optical loss, which easily doubles the threshold gain for lasing [7]. We will also present an alternative to the use of distributed Bragg reflectors as high-reflectivity mirrors, namely a TiO2/air high contrast gratings (HCGs). Fabricated HCGs of this type show a high reflectivity (>95%) over a 25 nm wavelength span, which is in excellent agreement to the reflectivity spectrum predicted by numerical simulations assuming an ideal HCG geometry [8]. References [1] T.-C. Lu, et al., Applied Physics Letters, 92, 14, (2008).[2] Y. Higuchi, et al., Applied physics express, 1, 12, 121102, (2008).[3] G. Cosendey, et al., Applied Physics Letters, 101, 15, (2012).[4] C. Holder, et al., Applied Physics Express, 5, 092104, (2012).[5] T. Onishi, et al., IEEE J. of Quantum Electronics, 48, 9,1107–1112, (2012).[6] W.-J. Liu, et al., Applied Physics Letters, 104, 251116 (2014).[7] E. Hashemi, et al., Optics Express, vol. 22 1, p. 411-426, (2014).[8] E. Hashemi, et al., Proceedings of SPIE, (0277-786X), vol. 9372 (2015).
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| 2. |
- Hashemi, Seyed Ehsan, 1986, et al.
(författare)
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Analysis of structurally sensitive loss in GaN-based VCSEL cavities and its effect on modal discrimination
- 2014
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Ingår i: Optics Express. - 1094-4087 .- 1094-4087. ; 22:1, s. 411-426
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Lateral loss causes optical energy to leave the laser cavity in the transverse, lateral, direction, and is sometimes neglected to simplify the numerical simulations. However, in contrast to outcoupling and absorption losses, we show that the lateral loss can change drastically with only nanometer-sized changes of the cavity structure, from being virtually zero to becoming the major source of cavity loss, since the cavity becomes antiguiding. This can be explained as the opening of a channel of efficient resonant lateral leakage of optical power at a certain oblique propagation angle. A number of different realizations of current apertures and top mirror designs in GaN-based VCSEL cavities, which have been suggested for realization of microcavity lasers emitting in the blue wavelength range, are simulated. Many of these are shown to lead to unintentional antiguiding, which can more than double the threshold gain for lasing. Notably, for strong enough antiguiding the resonant lateral leakage decreases so that the threshold gain values might again be tolerable. This regime has been suggested for robust single-mode operation since earlier predictions, building on analogies with slab waveguides, hinted at a very strong suppression of higher order modes. However, our simulations indicate that for the VCSEL cavities the derived formulas grossly overestimate the modal discrimination.
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| 3. |
- Hashemi, Seyed Ehsan, 1986, et al.
(författare)
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Engineering the Lateral Optical Guiding in Gallium Nitride (GaN)-based Vertical-Cavity Surface-Emitting Laser (VCSEL) Cavities to Reach the Lowest Threshold Gain
- 2013
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Ingår i: Japanese Journal of Applied Physics. - 1347-4065 .- 0021-4922. ; 52:8 PART 2, s. 08JG04 -
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- In order to improve the current injection in GaN-based blue vertical-cavity surface-emitting lasers (VCSELs) a dielectric aperture is generally used in combination with an indium–tin-oxide (ITO) layer on the top intracavity p-contact layer. The most straightforward way to realize this introduces a depression of the structure near the optical axis and we show, by using a two-dimensional (2D) effective index method and a three-dimensional (3D) coupled-cavity beam propagation method, that this typically results in optically anti-guided structures with associated high optical losses and thus very high threshold gains. Remarkably, the threshold gain reduces with increased negative guiding, which is due to improved lateral confinement and reduction of lateral leakage. Still, moderately positively guided designs should be preferred to avoid the detrimental effect of lateral leakage and high diffraction loss. To ensure positive index guiding, we propose to planarize the structure or introduce an elevation near the optical axis by additional processing, with an associated reduction in threshold material gain from 6000 to 2000 cm-1 for the studied structures.
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| 4. |
- Hashemi, Seyed Ehsan, 1986, et al.
(författare)
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Engineering the transverse optical guiding in GaN-based VCSELs to avoid detrimental optical loss
- 2012
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Ingår i: International Workshop on Nitride Semiconductors 2012, October 14-19, 2012, Sapporo, Japan, p. ThP-OD-33.
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Konferensbidrag (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- In order to improve the current injection in GaN-based blue vertical cavity surface emitting lasers (VCSELs) a dielectric aperture is generally used in combination with an indium-tin-oxide (ITO) layer on the top intracavity p-contact layer. The most straightforward way to realize this introduces a depression of the structure near the optical axis and we show, by using a 2D effective index method and a 3D coupled-cavity beam propagation method, that this typically results in optically anti-guided structures with associated high optical losses and thus very high threshold gains. Remarkably, the threshold gain reduces with increased negative guiding, which is due to improved lateral confinement and reduction of lateral leakage. Still, moderately positively guided designs should be preferred to avoid the detrimental effect of lateral leakage and high diffraction loss. To ensure positive index guiding, we propose to planarize the structure or introduce an elevation near the optical axis by additional processing, with an associated reduction in threshold material gain from 6000 cm-1 to 2000 cm-1 for the studied structures.
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| 5. |
- Hashemi, Seyed Ehsan, 1986, et al.
(författare)
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Triggering of guiding and antiguiding effects in GaN-based VCSELs
- 2014
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Ingår i: Proceedings of SPIE - The International Society for Optical Engineering. - : SPIE. - 0277-786X .- 1996-756X. ; 9001
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Konferensbidrag (refereegranskat)abstract
- We show numerically that many recently proposed GaN-based VCSEL cavities, with DBR mirrors deposited onto the current aperture, balance dangerously close to the border between the guided and antiguided regime. A guided cavity is often preferred because of its lower optical loss, but a strongly antiguided cavity offers built-in modal discrimination favoring single fundamental mode operation. We show that very small changes in the VCSEL structure are sufficient to strongly change the guiding character of the VCSEL cavity, and that thermal lensing caused by device self-heating under operation can dramatically reduce the optical loss but not the modal discrimination in the antiguided cavities.
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