POLARIZATION COMPETITION AND NOISE PROPERTIES OF VCSELS

A detailed experimental characterization of the dynamics of Vertical C avity Surface Emitting Lasers (VCSELs) is presented. Evidence of stron g anticorrelations between the different states of linear polarization of the field is given. As a consequence, it is shown that the noise o f the single states of polarization is much higher than the total inte nsity noise. The dynamics of the polarizations is studied, showing tha t the statistics of the fluctuations is non-Gaussian in the competitio n regime. (C) 1998 Elsevier Science B.V.