Virtual Journal of Laser

The fundamental and dynamic properties of InGaAs-InGaAsP lasers, where emission wavelengths were blue-shifted by quantum-well intermixing through ion implantation and annealing, were investigated to assess possible degradation by intermixing. It was found that the fundamental properties such as threshold current and slope efficiency were largely unchanged even after as much as 120 nm of wavelength shift. Meanwhile, the dynamic properties such as modulation efficiency and
$K$ factor were degraded after just a moderate degree of intermixing, but the degradation was not worsened by further intermixing. Provided the finite degradation of dynamic properties is tolerable, the present intermixing technique will be very useful for the fabrication of photonic integrated circuits.

This paper reports on the effect of nanometer-scale photonic crystal structures on the enhancement of the light extraction in GaN light-emitting diodes. Photonic crystals with hole or pillar-patterned structures with lattice constants of 460, 600, 750, and 920 nm are fabricated on indium-doped tin oxide (ITO) electrodes and/or p-GaN layers using laser holography and reactive ion etching. It is found that the light extraction efficiency depends strongly on the distance between the photonic crystal and the active layer, as well as the lattice constant for both structures. Photonic crystal light-emitting diodes (LEDs) with a lattice constant of 750 nm and hole depths of 260 nm in the ITO layer show an increase in light extraction of up to 32%, compared to conventional LEDs, without degradation in the electrical properties while a maximum enhancement of 26% is obtained from the device with a lattice constant of 460 nm and pillar heights of 60 nm on the p-GaN layer. The dependence of the extraction efficiency on the lattice constant is also calculated using a 3-D finite-difference time-domain method and compared with experimental results.

We propose a tunable erbium doped fiber laser based on a Fabry-Pérot (F-P) cavity tuned by an electrostatic actuator. The device is made of single crystalline silicon. The F-P cavity consists of two Bragg mirrors, one being displaced by a comb-drives actuator. The F-P cavity, grooves for optical fibers and electro-mechanical structure are fabricated by deep reactive ion etching on a 70
$mu{rm m}$ silicon on insulator wafer and are integrated in a ring fiber laser. The resulting tunable fiber laser has a tuning range of 35 nm in the C-band and a spectral width of less than 0.06 nm. The maximum applied voltage for full tuning of the laser is 37 V. The mechanical resonance frequency of the actuated mirror is 14.4 kHz allowing fast tuning of the laser. The maximum output power is 1.8 mW.

We make a systematic study to find the dependence of the threshold current density of a mid-infrared quantum-cascade laser on the waveguide ridge width. The optical and thermal parameters of the waveguide are calculated with a finite-element method, and gain is found from a self-consistent rate equation model with energy-balance. The results show the existence of an optimal ridge width that minimizes the threshold current density of the laser. The influence of the interface roughness parameters on laser performance is also discussed.

This paper analyzes a model of a transition radiation laser based on stimulated emission induced by relativistic electrons crossing the boundary between two media of different dielectric properties. Interaction between the incident radiation and the electrons in this boundary region is taken into account. Phenomenological quantum electrodynamics is applied to derive analytical expressions for stimulated emission and absorption probabilities. Analogs of Einstein's coefficients for the transition processes have also been derived and discussed. It is shown that stimulated emission is greater than absorption. The gain is then calculated.

A chemical gas-phase reaction between
${rm Cl}_{2}$ and HI was used in the generation of molecular iodine for the chemical oxygen-iodine laser (COIL) operation. A yield of
${rm I}_{2}$ in the generation reaction up to 85% was achieved in a reasonable volume of the reactor. A small-signal gain up to 0.75%/cm at a temperature of 150 K in the center of supersonic cavity was measured. A comparison with the established evaporation way of
${rm I}_{2}$ delivery confirmed that the chemical method has little or no impact on the COIL pumping kinetics. This chemical method is easily scalable and can simplify the COIL operation by providing better control of
${rm I}_{2}$ flow rate.

In this paper, precise synchronization of the femtosecond and picosecond laser regenerative amplifiers with different wavelengths and independent seed oscillators was achieved using the electronic phase-locked loop and global clock techniques. The root-mean-square relative timing jitter of the two regenerative amplifiers was measured as 0.66 ps using a modified statistical method based on the error propagation relation between the independent variables and the conventional optical cross-correlation technique. The results suggest that this method is more accurate and requires simple optical setups for low-pulse repetition rate lasers.

The dynamics of a distributed Bragg reflector laser with optical losses in the Bragg section is studied in detail. It is found that the modulation response depends not only on the detuning of the lasing wavelength from the Bragg reflectivity peak but also on the magnitude of the waveguide losses in the Bragg section. Depending on the losses, the damping of the relaxation peak can either increase or decrease when the laser is detuned on the long wavelength flank of the Bragg peak. Hence, in order to achieve maximum modulation bandwidth of the laser, the laser needs not only to have the correct detuning but also an optimized waveguide loss in the Bragg section. The physical reason for this dependence is discussed in terms of a modified rate equation model.

A widely-tunable single-mode 1.3
$mu{rm m}$ vertical-cavity surface-emitting laser structure incorporating a microelectromechanical system-tunable high-index-contrast subwavelength grating (HCG) mirror is suggested and numerically investigated. A linear tuning range of 100 nm and a wavelength tuning efficiency of 0.203 are predicted. The large tuning range and efficiency are attributed to the incorporation of the tuning air gap as part of the optical cavity and to the use of a short cavity structure. The short cavity length can be achieved by employing a HCG design of which the reflection mechanism does not rely on resonant coupling. The absence of resonance coupling leads to a
$0.59 lambda$-thick penetration depth of the HCG and enables to use a
$0.25 lambda$-thick tuning air gap underneath the HCG. This considerably reduces the effective cavity length, leading to larger tuning range and efficiency.

This paper presents a proposal of a novel optically reconfigurable gate array architecture with a microelectromechanical system (MEMS) mirror array that allows high-speed reconfiguration by exploiting large-bandwidth optical connections between the MEMS mirror array and a programmable gate array. The MEMS mirror array is used as a holographic memory. Four configuration contexts can be programmed electrically and dynamically onto the MEMS mirror array as holographic memory information. The configuration procedure is executed by switching both a laser array and an MEMS mirror array. This experiment demonstrated a four-context 146 ns microelectromechanical configuration for a programmable gate array. Sub-microsecond configuration is attainable.