CURRENT SPREADING AND CARRIER DIFFUSION IN LONG-WAVELENGTH VERTICAL-CAVITY SURFACE-EMITTING LASERS

Authors
Citation
Yy. Xiong et Yh. Lo, CURRENT SPREADING AND CARRIER DIFFUSION IN LONG-WAVELENGTH VERTICAL-CAVITY SURFACE-EMITTING LASERS, IEEE photonics technology letters, 10(9), 1998, pp. 1202-1204
Citations number
11
Categorie Soggetti
Optics,"Physics, Applied
ISSN journal
10411135
Volume
10
Issue
9
Year of publication
1998
Pages
1202 - 1204
Database
ISI
SICI code
1041-1135(1998)10:9<1202:CSACDI>2.0.ZU;2-U
Abstract
Current spreading and carrier diffusion in vertical-cavity surface-emi tting lasers (VCSEL's) critically affect the threshold current density , transverse gain profile, and optical modal characteristics of the de vices. We have numerically analyzed these effects for four popular lon g-wavelength VCSEL structures with wafer-bonded GaAs-AlGaAs Bragg bott om mirrors. The results show that current confinement for p-mirror VCS EL's is approximately twice as effective as the corresponding n-mirror VCSEL's, although the confinement factor for all practical VCSEL stru ctures studied here is considerably lower than the ''ideal'' structure . Calculations also show a strong dependence of current confinement on device aperture size and a tradeoff between the optical modal propert y and the current confinement efficiency for different apertured devic es.