High temperature and high frequency performance of gain-guided surface emitting lasers

For the first time, 860 nm gain-guided top surface emitting lasers (SEL) that operate continuous wave up to 90 degrees C and can be amplitude modulated at frequencies beyond 5 GHz are demonstrated. Laser thresholds as low as 2 mA and output powers more than 1 mW were obtained at room temperature. Singlemode emission with sidemode suppression greater than 50 dB was also observed. The higher operating temperature was achieved by grading the doping in semiconductor distributed Bragg reflectors such that resistive heating was lowered without increasing free carrier absorption.