Recent advances in vertical cavity surface emitting lasers and their applications

Summary form only given. There has been tremendous progress on vertical cavity surface emitting lasers (VCSEL) in the past several years. Advances on device performance continue to proceed at an ever increasing rate. In addition, VCSEL-based transmitters are expected to play a key role in datacom market. In this tutorial, we will review some state-of-the-art results, both at device level as well as system results. We will discuss VCSEL designs for emission at wide range of wavelengths from 650 nm to 1.55 /spl mu/m. Progress on tunable VCSELs, multiwavelength laser arrays will be reviewed. Packaging, reliability, and thermal management will be discussed. Finally, an overview of future prospects and directions will be discussed.