Electromagnetic field confined and tailored with a few air holes in a photonic-crystal fiber

Conventional and scanning near-field optical microscopy techniques are cross referenced to femtosecond nonlinear-optical measurements and finite-element numerical simulations to visualize and analyze a strong confinement of electromagnetic radiation in guided modes of a photonic-crystal fiber with only a few air holes surrounding the fiber core. A nonlinear coefficient of about 120 W⁻¹ km⁻¹ is achieved at the wavelength of 670 nm for a fused-silica fiber with a full hexagonal cycle of closely packed air holes around the fiber core. The removal of a single element from this array of air holes is shown to frustrate field confinement in guided modes, leading to mode leakage.     

Power dissipation in oxide-confined 980-nm vertical-cavity surface-emitting lasers

We presented 980-nm oxide-confined vertical-cavity surface-emitting lasers (VCSELs) with a 16-μm oxide aperture. Optical power, voltage, and emission wavelength are measured in an ambient temperature range of 5℃ C-80℃. Measurements combined with an empirical model are used to analyse the power dissipation in the device and the physical mechanism contributing to the thermal rollover phenomenon in VCSEL. It is found that the carrier leakage induced selfheating in the active region and the Joule heating caused by the series resistance are the main sources of power dissipation. In addition, carrier leakage induced selfheating increases as the injection current increases, resulting in a rapid decrease of the internal quantum efficiency, which is a dominant contribution to the thermal rollover of the VCSEL at a larger current. Our study provides useful guidelines to design a 980-nm oxide-confined VCSEL for thermal performance enhancement.     

Analysis of anticipated performance of 650-nm GaInP/AlGaInP quantum-well GaAs-based VCSELs at elevated temperatures

The possibility of application of the 650-nm oxide-confined GaInP/AlGaInP quantum-well vertical-cavity surface-emitting diode lasers (VCSELs) at elevated temperatures as sources of the carrier 650-nm wave in the fibre optical communication using POFs has been investigated with the aid of the comprehensive self-consistent model. An increase in the VCSEL threshold current at higher temperatures has been found to be mostly associated with both the carrier leakage from the valley of the Ga_0.43In_0.57P quantum-well material to the X-valley of the (Al_0.67Ga_0.33)_0.52In_0.48P barriers and the band-to-band absorption within the Ga_0.52In_0.48P layer of the band-gap comparable with the energy of emitted radiation. Nevertheless, the AlGaInP VCSELs exhibit encouraging thermal behaviour with the characteristic temperature T₀ equal to as much as 134 K for the active-region temperatures up to 357 K. For the 5-μm devices, the maximal achievable output has been determined to decrease from a quite high value of 1.0 mW for 293 K to 0.6 mW for 320 K and to still high 0.33 mW for 340 K. However, an efficient operation of the above VCSEL at elevated temperatures requires still some structure modifications leading to a reduction of both the above effects, the electron leakage from the valley and the band-to-band absorption within GaInP layers.     

新型垂直腔面发射半导体激光器阵列

设计出四次质子注入工艺制备垂直腔面发射激光器(VCSEL)阵列的方法,实现了对阵列中单元器件间的隔离以及对单元器件注入电流限制的分别作用。一方面通过对VCSEL外延片上分布布拉格反射镜(DBR)两次较浅的质子注入形成高电阻区域实现对阵列中单元器件间的隔离,另一方面通过再次的两次较深度的可以达到有源区上表面的质子注入形成高电阻区域实现对单元器件注入电流的限制。由瞬态热传导方程对阵列中单元器件间的热相互作用进行了理论分析。采用四次质子注入工艺实现了2×2、3×3简单的二维GaAs/AlGaAs量子阱VCSEL阵列,并对器件的激射近场、光谱特性及功率等进行了测量。     

Single-mode low threshold current multi-hole vertical-cavity surface-emitting lasers

A multi-hole vertical-cavity surface-emitting laser (VCSEL) operating in stable single mode with a low threshold current was produced by introducing multi-leaf scallop holes on the top distributed Bragg-reflector of an oxidation-confined 850 nm VCSEL. The single-mode output power of 2.6 mW, threshold current of 0.6 mA, full width of half maximum lasing spectrum of less than 0.1 nm, side mode suppression ratio of 28.4 dB, and far-field divergence angle of about 10° are obtained. The effects of different hole depths on the optical characteristics are simulated and analysed, including far-field divergence, spectrum and lateral cavity mode. The single-mode performance of this multi-hole device is attributed to the large radiation loss from the inter-hole spacing and the scattering loss at the bottom of the holes, particularly for higher order modes.     

Single-mode low threshold current multi-hole vertical-cavity surface-emitting lasers

A multi-hole vertical-cavity surface-emitting laser(VCSEL) operating in stable single mode with a low threshold current was produced by introducing multi-leaf scallop holes on the top distributed Bragg-reflector of an oxidationconfined 850 nm VCSEL.The single-mode output power of 2.6 mW,threshold current of 0.6 mA,full width of half maximum lasing spectrum of less than 0.1 nm,side mode suppression ratio of 28.4 dB,and far-field divergence angle of about 10 are obtained.The effects of different hole depths on the optical characteristics are simulated and analysed,including far-field divergence,spectrum and lateral cavity mode.The single-mode performance of this multi-hole device is attributed to the large radiation loss from the inter-hole spacing and the scattering loss at the bottom of the holes,particularly for higher order modes.     

Thermal analysis of high-index-contrast grating (HCG)-based VCSEL

A 3-D thermal analysis of 870 nm high-index-contrast grating (HCG)-based vertical cavity surface emitting laser (VCSEL) by using finite volume method (FVM) is presented in this paper. The HCG-based VCSEL is modeled by applying a steady-state 3-D heat dissipation model. Temperature distribution profile and thermal resistance (R_th) of the device are investigated by inserting the heat source value into the thermal simulation. Also, this analysis is performed for a conventional VCSEL operating at the same wavelength and under the same injected current as well as the same geometric sizes. The analysis shows that the maximum temperature inside the HCG-based VCSEL is lower than that inside the conventional VCSEL.     

Continuous‐wave vertically emitting photonic crystal terahertz laser

Compact semiconductor light sources with high performance continuous‐wave (CW) and single mode operation are highly demanded for many applications in the terahertz (THz) frequency range. Distributed feedback (DFB) and photonic crystal (PhC) quantum cascade (QC) lasers are amongst the leading candidates in this field. Absorbing boundary condition is a commonly used method to control the optical performance of a laser in double‐metal confinement. However, this approach increases the total loss in the device and results in a large threshold current density, limiting the CW maximum output power and operating temperature. In this letter, a robust surface emitting continuous‐wave terahertz QC laser is realized in a two‐dimensional PhC structure by a second order Bragg grating extractor that simultaneously provides the boundary condition necessary for mode selection. This results in a 3.12 THz single mode CW operation with a 3 mW output power and a maximum operation temperature (T_max) of 100 K. Also, a highly collimated far‐field pattern is demonstrated, which is an important step towards real world applications.     

Current spreading modification to enhance single-fundamental-mode VCSEL operation at higher temperatures

Continuous-wave (CW) performance of modern oxide-confined (OC) vertical-cavity surface-emitting diode lasers (VCSELs) at room and elevated temperatures is investigated with the aid of the comprehensive fully self-consistent optical-electrical-thermal-gain model. A standard OC GaInNAs/GaAs double-quantum-well VCSEL emitting the 1.3-μm radiation is used as a typical modern VCSEL structure. The oxide aperture is placed at the anti-node position of an optical standing wave within a VCSEL cavity. The desired single-fundamental-mode (SFM) operation has been found to be expected only in VCSELs equipped with relatively small active regions of diameters equal or smaller than 10 μm. Therefore a proton implantation used as an radial additional confinement of the current spreading from the upper annular contact towards the centrally located active region is proposed and its impact on the VCSEL performance is investigated. The above structure modification has been found to enable a radical improvement in the VCSEL performance. In particular, in this case, the SFM VCSEL operation is possible even in VCSELs with quite large active regions and for much wider ambient-temperature range than in the standard OC VCSELs.     

Light focusing by slot Fabry-Perot photonic crystal nanoresonator on scanning tip

We numerically investigate the propagation of light through the photonic crystal (PhC) waveguide on low refraction index material for near-field light focusing at the visible wavelength (635 nm) by incorporating a center air slot and Fabry-Perot resonator on the scanning tip. Perturbations by water and substrate refraction index changes of the PhC are analyzed by the finite-difference time-domain method to show minimal impact on light confinement and throughput. Such a total dielectric probe tip design has great potential to complement the current widely used metal-coated optical-fiber-based light confinement probe.     

表面液晶-垂直腔面发射激光器阵列的热特性

液晶与垂直腔面发射半导体激光器(VCSELs)阵列结合可实现波长可调谐、偏振精确控制等,同时液晶的引入也会改变垂直腔面发射半导体激光器阵列的热特性,本文设计了表面液晶-垂直腔面发射激光器阵列结构,并开展了阵列的热特性实验研究.对比分析了向列相液晶层对VCSEL阵列热特性的影响,实验结果表明,1×1,2×2,3×3三种表面液晶-VCSEL阵列的阈值电流温度变化率最高可降低23.6%,热阻降低26.75%;同时,激光器阵列各发光单元之间的温度均匀性显著提高,出光孔与周围温差小于0.5℃.综上所述,VCSEL阵列中液晶层的引入不仅大大加速激光器阵列单元热量扩散,而且降低了有源区结温,提高了VCSELs激光器阵列热特性,为实现高光束质量的单偏振波长可控VCSEL激光器阵列打下了良好的理论和实验基础.     

Analysis of single-mode condition and high-order modes discrimination in photonic crystal VCSEL

A new technique for analyzing the single-mode condition and mode discrimination of high-order modes in photonic crystal VCSEL is proposed and reported in this paper. The technique proposed is a semi-empirical approach that uses analytical analysis based on experimental data. For that purpose, single- and multimode photonic crystal VCSEL devices are fabricated and characterized for comparison of device performance. The mode width for first- and second-order mode of PhC VCSEL is computed for analyzing the mode behavior. In order to verify the findings, the fabricated single- and multimode devices are analyzed using finite difference frequency domain technique for the purpose of showing the loss as a function of mode order for the PhC VCSEL. The results show close agreement between the computed and experiment findings, justifying the use of the proposed semi-empirical technique for analyzing single-mode condition and of high-order modes discrimination in photonic crystal VCSEL.     

Numerical modelling of optical trapping in hollow photonic crystal cavities

Photonic crystal (PhC) devices owing to their strong confinement of electromagnetic energy are considered to be excellent candidates for on chip optical trapping of dielectric or biological particles in the nanometer range. In this work, we study and present hollow PhC cavities and characterize them for their trapping stiffness, trapping stability and variation of resonance wavelength due to the presence of various sized single particles in the cavity.     

Thermal hadronization and Hawking–Unruh radiation in QCD

We conjecture that, because of color confinement, the physical vacuum forms an event horizon for quarks and gluons, which can be crossed only by quantum tunneling, i.e., through the QCD counterpart of Hawking radiation at black holes. Since such radiation cannot transmit information to the outside, it must be thermal, of a temperature determined by the chromodynamic force at the confinement surface, and it must maintain color neutrality. We explore the possibility that the resulting process provides a common mechanism for thermal hadron production in high energy interactions, from e⁺e^- annihilation to heavy ion collisions. PACS 04.70.Dy; 12.38.Aw; 12.38.Mh; 12.40.Ee; 25.75.Nq; 97.60.Lf     

Research on terahertz photonic crystal fiber characteristics with high birefringence

A new high birefringence photonic crystal fiber is proposed within the terahertz frequency region. It has two types of claddings, the inner is composed of six ellipse air holes arranged in a honeycomb array and the outer surrounded by circle holes. By using the full vector finite element method with anisotropic perfectly matched layers absorption boundary condition, the birefringence, chromatic dispersion and confinement loss of the fundamental mode are evaluated. The results show that the birefringence can achieve 10⁻³ when the wavelength increases from 600 μm to 900 μm. This structure will provide some reference value for the designing of high birefringence terahertz photonic crystal fiber.     

Thin film ferroelectric photonic crystals and their application to thermo-optic switches

Two-dimensional photonic crystals (PhC) using epitaxial ferroelectric, barium titanate (BTO) thin films as the dielectric medium were fabricated and their thermo-optical response measured and compared to theory. The nanopatterned PhC consists of a square array of air holes 300 nm deep, a period of 780 nm and area 200 × 200 μm². The large refractive index of BTO leads to a high contrast structure that shows strong optical diffraction. Optical diffraction is analyzed along the 〈1 0〉 and 〈1 1〉 directions from phase grating measurements. The thermal tunability of BTO PhC is characterized from the attenuation of the first order diffraction. There is a 3 dB extinction ratio when the temperature increases by 120 °C, which corresponds to an increase of 0.05 in the BTO refractive index. Finite difference time domain (FDTD) technique is used to calculate the PhC band structure and the temperature dependence of the diffraction efficiency. The large change in the diffraction efficiency indicates that thermally tunable BTO PhCs may be useful as active ultra-compact photonic switches.     

Enhancement of photoluminescence from germanium by utilizing air-bridge-type photonic crystal slab

We fabricated germanium-based photonic crystal (PhC) slabs and characterized them by photoluminescence (PL) measurements at room temperature. Air-bridge-type Ge PhC slabs showed stronger PL than non-processed Ge layers on SiO₂ and than Ge PhC slabs on SiO₂. This enhancement is attributed to improved extraction efficiency due to the PhC patterns and to suppressed light leakage into the substrate by utilizing the air-suspended structure. In particular, when flat photonic band-edge modes around the Γ point are tuned to the Ge emission range, larger enhancement of integrated PL intensity was observed. A maximum enhancement ratio of integrated intensity up to 22 was demonstrated in an air-suspended Ge PhC slab with appropriate structural parameters. This is the largest enhancement factor of Ge PL using photonic nanostructures reported so far.     

光子晶体发光二极管光抽取效率及远场辐射特性的数值研究

运用三维时域有限差分法,研究了完美/缺陷光子晶体特定参量的改变对发光二极管光抽取效率影响,得出优化参量.基于近场远场转换,进一步分析了两种不同类型的缺陷引入及其周边空气孔半径的改变对光子晶体发光二极管远场辐射特性的影响.数值研究的结果表明,通过引入缺陷以及减小缺陷周围空气孔半径能够同时提高光子晶体发光二极管的光抽取效率和远场辐射方向性.     

Transmission characteristics simulation of an erbium-doped lithium niobate film photonic crystal slab

A photonic crystal slab (PhC slab) which was constructed as a 2D hexagonal lattice with a finite depth was etched into an Er:LiNbO₃ film waveguide. The band diagrams and transmission spectra were simulated by plane wave expansion (PWE) and the finite-difference time-domain (FDTD) method. A high refractive index contrast of 0.5 enables strong light confinement in the vertical direction and a broad band gap. The simulated transmittance spectra indicate that the stop band is determined by lattice constant. The transmission spectra along ΓM of the PhC slab with a lattice constant 500 nm show a 250-nm broad stop band in the wavelength range from 1.33 to 1.58 μm and sharp band edge.