Room-Temperature Optically Pumped (Al)GaSb Vertical-Cavity Surface-Emitting Laser Monolithically Grown on an Si(1 0 0) Substrate

Author

Balakrishnan, Ganesh ; Jallipalli, Anitha ; Rotella, Paul ; Huang, Shenghong ; Khoshakhlagh, Arezou ; Amtout, Abdenour ; Krishna, Sanjay ; Dawson, L. Ralph ; Huffaker, Diana L.

Author_Institution

Center for High Technol. Mater., New Mexico Univ., Albuquerque, NM

Volume

12

Issue

6

fYear

2006

Firstpage

1636

Lastpage

1641

Abstract

We report a monolithic vertical-cavity surface-emitting laser (VCSEL) on an Si(0 0 1) substrate operating under room-temperature optically pumped conditions. The GaSb multi-quantum well active region in an Al(Ga)Sb half-wave cavity spacer layer is embedded in AlSb/AlGaSb distributed Bragg reflectors. The 13% lattice mismatch is accommodated by a self-assembled two-dimensional array of 90deg interfacial misfit dislocations resulting in spontaneously relaxed (~98%) and very low defect density (~10⁶/cm ²) epilayers. The material characterization is conducted through atomic force microscopy, transmission electron microscopy, and etch-pit density studies. The VCSEL characterization includes lasing spectra and light-in versus light-out curves. A 3-mm pump spot size results in peak threshold excitation density of I_th=0.1 mJ/cm ² and a multimode lasing spectrum peak at 1.62 mum. The average output power measured from the device is 25 muW at 1.6I_th

Keywords

III-V semiconductors; aluminium compounds; atomic force microscopy; dislocations; distributed Bragg reflector lasers; gallium compounds; integrated optoelectronics; laser cavity resonators; laser modes; monolithic integrated circuits; optical pumping; quantum well lasers; self-assembly; surface emitting lasers; transmission electron microscopy; (Al)GaSb laser; 1.62 mum; 293 to 298 K; 3 mm; AlSb-AlGaSb; GaSb multiquantum well; Si; Si(100) substrate; atomic force microscopy; defect density epilayers; distributed Bragg reflectors; etch-pit density; excitation density; half-wave cavity spacer layer; interfacial misfit dislocations; lasing spectra; lattice mismatch; material characterization; monolithic growth; multimode lasing spectrum; optical pumping; room temperature; self-assembled two-dimensional array; spontaneous relaxation; transmission electron microscopy; vertical-cavity surface emitting laser; Atomic force microscopy; Distributed Bragg reflectors; Gas lasers; Laser excitation; Lattices; Optical pumping; Pump lasers; Surface emitting lasers; Transmission electron microscopy; Vertical cavity surface emitting lasers; Integrated optoelectronics; semiconductor lasers;

fLanguage

English

Journal_Title

Selected Topics in Quantum Electronics, IEEE Journal of

Publisher

ieee

ISSN

1077-260X

Type

jour

DOI

10.1109/JSTQE.2006.885342

Filename

4032627