Dynamic holography in a broad-area optically pumped vertical GaAs microcavity

A broad-surface-area vertical GaAs microcavity was operated as an adaptive holographic film. The cavity mirrors were transparent to high-energy; (mill ijoules per square centimeter) hologram writing pulses at a wavelength of 7 30 nm that generated optically pumped gain gratings in a 1-mum-thick active layer of GaAs. The gain gratings were probed with a low-intensity (mW) tun able laser at wavelengths near the GaAs band edge in the high-reflectance b andwidth of the cavity Bragg mirrors. When the structure was designed with low mirror reflectances [(R1R2)(1/2) = 90%] to operate below the lasing thr eshold, the cavity resonance bandwidth was sufficiently broad to permit hom ogeneous hologram readout over a large (several square millimeters) area. D iffraction efficiencies of approximately 10% were predicted and approached experimentally. These results represent a first step toward the realization of a holographic vertical-cavity surface-emitting laser structure. (C) 200 1 Optical Society of America.