Sheer power

Researchers at the State University of New York have used inductively coupled plasma (ICP) reactive ion etching (RIE) to manufacture a ridge waveguide based diode laser. The result was record-breaking 37 mW continuous-wave operation at room temperature for micrometre wavelengths. In the work presented in this issue of Electronics Letters, the etching was, said Hosoda, “stopped in AlGaAsSb cladding layer to minimise internal optical loss due to overlap of optical field with metal layers, which was not possible with wet etching techniques.”