Design, fabrication and optical characterization of GaAs photonic crystal nanocavity lasers with InAs quantum dots gain wafer-bonded onto Si substrates

We designed and fabricated III–V compound semiconductor two-dimensional photonic crystal (PhC) thin film slabs with quantum dots (QDs) inside formed on Si substrates for highly integrated silicon photonic circuits with built-in nanolasers. Defect-shifted L3 type PhC nanocavities formed in GaAs thin films embedding 1.3 μm-emitting InAs QDs layer-transferred onto Si substrates were investigated. Quality factors <1000 for the PhC nanocavities on SiO2 were enhanced up to ∼8000 by removing SiO2 to form air-bridge structures, resulting in room temperature, continuous wave lasing.