Effect of spatial hole burning on injection-locked vertical-cavity surface-emitting laser arrays

Injection locking of vertical-cavity surface-emitting laser arrays is analy zed at steady state, including the effect of spatial hole burning. A free-r unning laser array (i.e., without injection), that operates well-above thre shold, can exhibit multimode oscillations. Consequently, each of the free-r unning modes (at different frequencies) needs a different locking injection power. For low pump levels, just above threshold, the array is single mode and, as expected, the results bear a close resemblance to those of the ave rage gain analysis, which ignores spatial hole burning. (C) 2000 Optical So ciety of America. OCIS codes: 140.3290, 140.3520,250.7260.