Optical facet coatings for high-performance LWIR quantum cascade lasers atλ∼8.5μm

We report on the performance improvement of long-wave infrared quantum cascade lasers(LWIR QCLs)by studying and optimizing the anti-reflection(AR)optical facet coating.Compared to the Al2O3 AR coat⁃ing,the Y_(2)O_(3)AR coating exhibits higher catastrophic optical mirror damage(COMD)level,and the optical facet coatings of both material systems have no beam steering effect.A 3-mm-long,9.5-μm-wide buried-heterostruc⁃ture(BH)LWIR QCL ofλ~8.5μm with Y_(2)O_(3)metallic high-reflection(HR)and AR of~0.2%reflectivity coating demonstrates a maximum pulsed peak power of 2.19 W at 298 K,which is 149%higher than that of the uncoated device.For continuous-wave(CW)operation,by optimizing the reflectivity of the Y_(2)O_(3)AR coating,the maximum output power reaches 0.73 W,which is 91%higher than that of the uncoated device.

A tunnel regenerated coupled multi-active-region large optical cavity laser with a high quality beam

A novel coupled multi-active-region large optical cavity structure cascaded by a tunnel junction is proposed to solve the problems of facet catastrophic optical damage （COD） and the large vertical divergence caused by the thin emitting area in conventional laser diodes. For a laser with three active regions, a slope efficiency as high as 1.49 W/A, a vertical divergence angle of 17.4~, and a threshold current density of 271 A/cm~ are achieved. By optimizing the structural parameters, the beam quMity is greatly improved, and the level of the COD power increases by more than two times compared with that of the conventional laser.

Study of quantum well mixing induced by impurity-free vacancy in the primary epitaxial wafers of a 915 nm semiconductor laser

Output power and reliability are the most important characteristic parameters of semiconductor lasers.However,catas-trophic optical damage(COD),which usually occurs on the cavity surface,will seriously damage the further improvement of the output power and affect the reliability.To improve the anti-optical disaster ability of the cavity surface,a non-absorption window(NAW)is adopted for the 915 nm InGaAsP/GaAsP single-quantum well semiconductor laser using quantum well mix-ing(QWI)induced by impurity-free vacancy.Both the principle and the process of point defect diffusion are described in detail in this paper.We also studied the effects of annealing temperature,annealing time,and the thickness of SiO_(2) film on the quan-tum well mixing in a semiconductor laser with a primary epitaxial structure,which is distinct from the previous structures.We found that when compared with the complete epitaxial structure,the blue shift of the semiconductor laser with the primary epi-taxial structure is larger under the same conditions.To obtain the appropriate blue shift window,the primary epitaxial struc-ture can use a lower annealing temperature and shorter annealing time.In addition,the process is less expensive.We also pro-vide references for upcoming device fabrication.

Research on quantum well intermixing of 680 nm AlGaInP/GaInP semiconductor lasers induced by composited Si-Si_(3)N_(4) dielectric layer

The optical catastrophic damage that usually occurs at the cavity surface of semiconductor lasers has become the main bottleneck affecting the improvement of laser output power and long-term reliability.To improve the output power of 680 nm AlGaInP/GaInP quantum well red semiconductor lasers,Si-Si_(3)N_(4)composited dielectric layers are used to induce its quantum wells to be intermixed at the cavity surface to make a non-absorption window.Si with a thickness of 100 nm and Si_(3)N_(4)with a thickness of 100 nm were grown on the surface of the epitaxial wafer by magnetron sputtering and PECVD as diffusion source and driving source,respectively.Compared with traditional Si impurity induced quantum well intermixing,this paper realizes the blue shift of 54.8 nm in the nonabsorbent window region at a lower annealing temperature of 600 ℃ and annealing time of 10 min.Under this annealing condition,the wavelength of the gain luminescence region basically does not shift to short wavelength,and the surface morphology of the whole epitaxial wafer remains fine after annealing.The application of this process condition can reduce the difficulty of production and save cost,which provides an effective method for upcoming fabrication.