Quantum Dot Laser Diodes Research Articles

On the relationship between electrical and electro-optical characteristics of InAs/InP quantum dot lasers

This paper addresses the electrical and electro-optical characteristics of InAs/InP quantum dot (QD) laser diodes operating under continuous wave in the temperature range of 285 K to 353 K. Experimental data together with a model lead to an identification of the current flow mechanism in all the important drive regimes: very low bias (pre radiation regime), the exponential region of the current-voltage (I-V) curve, and in the nonlinear range where spontaneous and stimulated emission take place. The analysis discriminates among bias regions where the influences of the QD or the optical confinement layers dominate. Additionally, parameters and non-nonlinear processes under injection into the active region are described here for the first time. A high level injection (spontaneous, as well as stimulation emission regimes) results in non-linear I-V characteristics. Above the threshold, the recombination rate increases due to rapid “pinning” of the quasi-Fermi levels leading to an anomalous kink of the power exponent voltage characteristics. This manifests itself as a non-linear differential resistance increase even at elevated temperatures, up to 353 K. Capacitance voltage measurements reveal some peculiarities, namely, well defined capacitance peaks related to the QDs, hysteresis, and a low frequency negative capacitance phenomenon which enhance the laser potential functional capability.

Saturation of absorption and gain with continuous-wave Cr4+: Fosferite laser in a quantum dot laser diode

Saturation of absorption and gain with continuous-wave Cr4+: Fosferite laser in a quantum dot laser diode

Development of Modulation p-Doped 1310 nm InAs/GaAs Quantum Dot Laser Materials and Ultrashort Cavity Fabry–Perot and Distributed-Feedback Laser Diodes

Multiple-layer InAs/GaAs quantum dot (QD) laser structures were etched to remove the p-side AlGaAs cladding layers to investigate the temperature-dependent photoluminescence (PL) characteristics. Four QD samples, including undoped as grown QDs, p-doped as grown QDs, undoped annealed QDs, and p-doped annealed QDs, were prepared by molecular beam epitaxy (MBE) and a postgrowth annealing process for comparison. Among them, modulation p-doped QD samples exhibit much less temperature-dependent characteristics of PL spectra and notable insensitivity to intermixing compared to undoped ones. This is attributed to the effects of modulation p-doping, which can inhibit holes’ thermal broadening in their closely spaced energy levels and significantly suppress In/Ga interdiffusion between QDs and their surrounding matrix. These results provide greater freedom in the choice of MBE growth for high-quality active regions and claddings of QD laser diodes. The superior features of the modulation p-doped QD materials have b...

Tunable Dual-Wavelength Heterogeneous Quantum Dot Laser Diode With a Silicon External Cavity

We propose a tunable dual-wavelength heterogeneous quantum dot laser diode. The tunable dual-wavelength laser consists of a quantum dot semiconductor optical amplifier as the optical gain medium and an external cavity fabricated from silicon photonics technology as the wavelength tunable filter. We successfully demonstrated dual-wavelength lasing oscillation by tuning the difference frequency from approximately 34 to 400 GHz.

Characterization of Gallium Indium Phosphide and Progress of Aluminum Gallium Indium Phosphide System Quantum-Well Laser Diode.

Highly ordered gallium indium phosphide layers with the low bandgap have been successfully grown on the (100) GaAs substrates, the misorientation toward [01−1] direction, using the low-pressure metal organic chemical vapor deposition method. It is found that the optical properties of the layers are same as those of the disordered ones, essentially different from the ordered ones having two orientations towards [1−11] and [11−1] directions grown on (100) gallium arsenide substrates, which were previously reported. The bandgap at 300 K is 1.791 eV. The value is the smallest ever reported, to our knowledge. The high performance transverse stabilized AlGaInP laser diodes with strain compensated quantum well structure, which is developed in 1992, have been successfully obtained by controlling the misorientation angle and directions of GaAs substrates. The structure is applied to quantum dots laser diodes. This paper also describes the development history of the quantum well and the quantum dots laser diodes, and their future prospects.

Compact All-Quantum-Dot-Based Tunable THz Laser Source

We demonstrate an ultracompact, room temperature, tunable terahertz (THz) generating laser source based on difference-frequency-driven photomixing in a coplanar stripline InAs/GaAs quantum-dot (QD) antenna pumped by a broadly tunable, high power, continuous wave InAs/GaAs QD laser diode in the double-grating quasi-Littrow configuration. The dual-wavelength QD laser operating in the 1150– 1301 nm wavelength region with a maximum output power of 280 mW and with tunable difference-frequency (277 GHz to 30 THz) was used to achieve tunable THz generation in the QD antenna with a photoconductive gap of 50 μm. The best THz output performance was observed at pump wavelengths around the first excited state of the InAs/GaAs QDs (∼1160 nm), where a maximum output power of 0.6 nW at 0.83 THz was demonstrated.

Extremely stable temperature characteristics of 1550-nm band, p-doped, highly stacked quantum-dot laser diodes

We fabricated 1.55-µm band, broad-area, p-doped, 30-layer stacked quantum-dot (QD) laser diodes (LDs) grown on an InP(311)B substrate via a delta-doping method employing a strain compensation technique. We doped Be atoms to a depth of 5 nm from the bottom of each QD layer. The concentration of Be atoms doped in the InGaAlAs spacer layer was 1 × 1018 cm−3. We observed a strong photoluminescence emission and a relatively coherent surface of QDs using atomic force microscopy. In addition, we observed that the fabricated QD-LDs had extremely stable temperature characteristics, and a characteristic temperature T0 of more than 2156 K was obtained.

Simple dispersion estimate for single-section quantum-dash and quantum-dot mode-locked laser diodes.

The optical outputs of single-section quantum-dash and quantum-dot mode-locked lasers (MLLs) are well known to exhibit strong group velocity dispersion. Based on careful measurements of the spectral phase of the pulses from these MLLs, we confirm that the difference in group delay between the modes at either end of the MLL spectrum equals the cavity round-trip time. This observation allows us to deduce an empirical formula relating the accumulated dispersion of the output pulse to the spectral extent and free-spectral range of the MLL. We find excellent agreement with previously reported dispersion measurements of both quantum-dash and quantum-dot MLLs over a wide range of operating conditions.

Large Signal Modulation Characteristics in the Transition Regime for Two-State Lasing Quantum Dot Lasers**Supported by the National Key Research and Development Program of China under Grant No 2016YFB0402302, and the National Natural Science Foundation of China under Grant No 91433206.

Large-signal modulation capability, as an important performance indicator, is directly related to the high-speed optical communication technology involved. We experimentally and theoretically investigate the large-signal modulation characteristics of the simultaneous ground-state (GS) and the excited-state (ES) lasing in InAs/GaAs quantum dot laser diodes. The large-signal modulation capability of total light intensity in the transition regime from GS lasing to two-state lasing is unchanged as the bias-current increases. However, GS and ES large-signal eye diagrams show obvious variations during the transition. Relaxation oscillations and large-signal eye diagrams for GS, ES, and total light intensities are numerically simulated and analyzed in detail by using a rate-equation model. The findings show that a complementary relationship between the light intensities for GS and ES lasing exists in both the transition regime and the two-state lasing regime, leading to a much smaller overshooting power and a shorter settling time for the total light intensity. Therefore, the eye diagrams of GS or ES lasing are diffuse whereas those of total light intensity are constant as the bias-current increases in the transition regime.

Design and Performance Analysis of Raman Amplified XG-PON System

This paper describes the design considerations and performance analysis for an XG-PON Raman amplification scheme. The experimental results and theoretical calculations presented in this paper demonstrate the feasibility of Raman amplification in O-band access systems; thus, enhancing the performance of existing access installations while still preserving the passive nature of these networks. With the availability of cost-effective quantum dot laser diodes as high-power pumps, Raman amplification is proving to be an attractive candidate for access applications. We experimentally demonstrate that it is possible to achieve a total pump power of 759 mW using polarization multiplexed quantum dot laser diodes (QD-LDs), and using a backward pumping scheme we can support a purely passive XG-PON system with 50 km reach and 64 splits. With system level numerical simulations, we illustrate the use of forward or bi-directional pumping scheme to increase the splits further. We also confirm that the Raman pump output in the experiments, despite being below the single mode cut off for the standard SMF, was efficiently coupled into the trunk fibre using off-the-shelf components. We also show using numerical simulations that a flat gain spectrum can be obtained with less than 0.7 dB gain variation across the XG-PON upstream wavelength band (1260–1280 nm) using a multi-wavelength pumping scheme with just two pump wavelengths. From a detailed system analysis, we discuss the impact of broadband filtering (20 nm) at the receiver adopted by the XG-PON standards, and show that lower class (N1) receivers can be adopted for Raman gains higher than 16 dB.

InAs/GaAs quantum dot lasers with GaP strain-compensation layers grown by molecular beam epitaxy

The strain-compensation (SC) technique to reduce the accumulation of strain is a promising approach to increase the design flexibility as well as the performance of quantum dot (QD) lasers. Here we have studied the application of tensile-strained ultra-thin GaP layers into multiple stacked InAs/GaAs QD grown by MBE. XRD analysis shows the controllability of the average strain in multiple-stacked QD active layer, revealing a reduction in accumulated strain. Fabricated QD laser diodes including thinner QD active layers realized by SC technology show a narrower vertical far-field angle and an increased small signal modulation bandwidth without loss of gain. Cross-sectional SEM image of SC-QD LD active region

Microscopic mechanism underlying double-state lasing in an InAs/GaAs quantum dot laser diode elucidated using coupled rate equations and the spontaneous emission recorded from a window structure.

We investigated the microscopic mechanism underlying the double-state lasing behavior (simultaneous lasing at the ground state [GS] and excited state [ES]) in InAs/GaAs quantum dot (QD) laser diodes. The ES and GS lasing processes that contributed to double-state lasing were examined experimentally and theoretically. Experiments were conducted in which spontaneous emission from a window of a QD laser diode was examined under lasing conditions, and numerical simulations were performed using a coupled rate equation model of the QD microstates. The findings showed that, when carrier relaxation from the ES to the GS was sufficiently slow, double-state lasing occurred. Additionally, ES lasing was found to arise not from the QD group undergoing GS lasing, but rather from another QD group in which the states were lower in energy and outside of the homogeneous bandwidth.

Improvement of Performance of Modulation Response and Bandwidth of InAs/GaAs Quantum-Dot Laser Diode

Improvement of Performance of Modulation Response and Bandwidth of InAs/GaAs Quantum-Dot Laser Diode

Gain and Threshold Current in Type II In(As)Sb Mid-Infrared Quantum Dot Lasers

In this work, we improved the performance of mid-infrared type II InSb/InAs quantum dot (QD) laser diodes by incorporating a lattice-matched p-InAsSbP cladding layer. The resulting devices exhibited emission around 3.1 µm and operated up to 120 K in pulsed mode, which is the highest working temperature for this type of QD laser. The modal gain was estimated to be 2.9 cm−1 per QD layer. A large blue shift (~150 nm) was observed in the spontaneous emission spectrum below threshold due to charging effects. Because of the QD size distribution, only a small fraction of QDs achieve threshold at the same injection level at 4 K. Carrier leakage from the waveguide into the cladding layers was found to be the main reason for the high threshold current at higher temperatures.

Wavelength tuning of InAs quantum dot laser by micromirror device

We report on the InAs quantum dot (QD) external cavity laser (ECL) using a digital mirror device (DMD) as the key component for wavelength tuning. The InAs QD laser diode was grown by gas source molecular-beam epitaxy, which had a broad gain profile. Single mode operation was achieved with the side mode suppression ratio of 21dB when the optical feedback was provided by a mirror pattern consisting of 9 micromirrors. Moreover, two-color lasing was demonstrated with two laser lines having frequency difference in the THz range. The incorporation of DMD in the ECL enables great flexibility and many unique features, such as high tuning speed independent of the tuning step, two-color or multi-color lasing, and adjustable intensity for individual laser lines.

Lasing characteristics of InP-based InAs quantum dots depending on InGaAsP waveguide conditions.

We report the influences of a dot-in-a-well structure with a thin GaAs layer and the thickness of a waveguide (WG) on the lasing characteristics of InAs quantum dots (QDs) based on InP. The QD laser diodes (QDLDs) consist of seven-stacked InAs QDs separated by a 10 nm-thick InGaAsP (1.15 μm, 1.15Q-InGaAsP) layer, which is further sandwiched by a 800 nm-thick 1.15Q-lnGaAsP WG (reference QDLD). For comparison, the InAs QDs were inserted into the InGaAsP (1.35 μm, 1.35Q-InGaAsP) quantum well embedded in the 1.15Q-InGaAsP matrix at the active layer. And a 2 monolayer (ML)-thick GaAs layer was additionally introduced right before the QD layer (GDWELL-LDs). Lasing emission from the reference QDLD with only the 1.15Q-InGaAsP structure was not observed at room temperature (RT). However, the lasing emission from the GDWELL-LDs was clearly observed at the wavelength of 1.46 μm at RT under continuous-wave (CW) mode. The threshold current density of the GDWELL-LD with the 800 nm-thick InGaAsP WG was measured to be 830 A/cm2, which was lower than that of the GDWELL-LD with the 200 nm-thick WG (900 A/cm2). Also, the slope efficiency of the GDWELL-LD was significantly improved with increasing thickness of the InGaAsP WG.

Thermal coefficient of InP-based quantum dot laser from cavity-mode measurements

The thermal coefficient of InP-based InAs quantum dot lasers covering its wavelength in the range of 1.55μm were reported. The measurements were based on analyzing the junction temperature in the active region. Under continuous wave mode, a more than 24°C junction temperature rise is obtained from the Fabry–Perot-cavity-mode shifts. The laser exhibits a coefficient of thermal resistance of 26.76°C/W when the injection current increases from 90 to 500mA. At the same time, a thermal resistivity of 8.62°Ccm/W with a thermal conductivity of 0.116W/cm°C was also obtained from the thermal resistance. The thermal resistance might be a crucial factor of quantum dot laser diodes and has greatly impact on their performance.

Switching between ground and excited states by optical feedback in a quantum dot laser diode

We demonstrate switching between ground state and excited state emission in a quantum-dot laser subject to optical feedback. Even though the solitary laser emits only from the excited state, we can trigger the emission of the ground state by optical feedback. We observe recurrent but incomplete switching between the two emission states by variation of the external cavity length in the sub-micrometer scale. We obtain a good qualitative agreement of experimental results with simulation results obtained by a rate equation that accounts for the variations of the feedback phase.

Gain and tuning characteristics of mid-infrared InSb quantum dot diode lasers

There have been relatively few reports of lasing from InSb quantum dots (QDs). In this work, type II InSb/InAs QD laser diodes emitting in the mid-infrared at 3.1 μm have been demonstrated and characterized. The gain was determined to be 2.9 cm−1 per QD layer, and the waveguide loss was ∼15 cm−1 at 4 K. Spontaneous emission measurements below threshold revealed a blue shift of the peak wavelength with increasing current, indicating filling of ground state heavy hole levels in the QDs. The characteristic temperature, T0 = 101 K below 50 K, but decreased to 48 K at higher temperatures. The emission wavelength of these lasers showed first a blue shift followed by a red shift with increasing temperature. A hybrid structure was used to fabricate the laser by combining a liquid phase epitaxy grown p-InAs0.61Sb0.13P0.26 lower cladding layer and an upper n+ InAs plasmon cladding layer which resulted in a maximum operating temperature (Tmax) of 120 K in pulsed mode, which is the highest reported to date.

Infrared laser pulse triggers increased singlet oxygen production in tumour cells

Photodynamic therapy (PDT) is a technique developed to treat the ever-increasing global incidence of cancer. This technique utilises singlet oxygen (1O2) generation via a laser excited photosensitiser (PS) to kill cancer cells. However, prolonged sensitivity to intensive light (6–8 weeks for lung cancer), relatively low tissue penetration by activating light (630 nm up to 4 mm), and the cost of PS administration can limit progressive PDT applications. The development of quantum-dot laser diodes emitting in the highest absorption region (1268 nm) of triplet oxygen (3O2) presents the possibility of inducing apoptosis in tumour cells through direct 3O2 → 1O2 transition. Here we demonstrate that a single laser pulse triggers dose-dependent 1O2 generation in both normal keratinocytes and tumour cells and show that tumour cells yield the highest 1O2 far beyond the initial laser pulse exposure. Our modelling and experimental results support the development of direct infrared (IR) laser-induced tumour treatment as a promising approach in tumour PDT.