Design of wide bandwidth, flat phase Al/sub x/O/sub y/-GaAs DBR mirrors for vertical cavity surface-emitting lasers

In this paper we develop expressions for the design of asymmetric, graded interface DBR mirrors by using the concept of characteristic matrices. This rigorous approach allowed for accurate solution of the wave equation (in both homogeneous and inhomogeneous layers) without any approximation. We investigate the two types of graded interface DBR mirrors for Vertical-Cavity Surface-Emitting Lasers: all-semiconductor DBR and oxide-semiconductor DBR. The advantages of using the wide bandwidth, flat phase oxide-semiconductor DBR mirrors over the all-semiconductor DBR mirrors have been presented.