Voltage Tunability of Quantum Cascade Lasers

Author

Yao, Yu ; Liu, Zhijun ; Hoffman, Anthony J. ; Franz, Kale J. ; Gmachl, Claire F.

Author_Institution

Dept. of Electr. Eng. & the Princeton Inst. for the Sci. & Technol. of Mater., Princeton Univ., Princeton, NJ

Volume

45

Issue

6

fYear

2009

fDate

6/1/2009 12:00:00 AM

Firstpage

730

Lastpage

736

Abstract

The voltage tunability of three types of quantum cascade laser designs is investigated. The tuning coefficients and tuning ranges of electroluminescence and laser emission from all designs are measured and compared with the calculated results. A reduced tunability was observed in all lasers above threshold. This is attributed to the decrease of resistance across the laser active region (AR) as the photon density increases. A resumed tunability high above threshold occurs in all lasers with anticrossed injector ground and upper laser states. Lasers based on the anticrossed diagonal transition are tunable above threshold, with a tuning range of about 30 cm^-1 (~3% of the laser emission wavenumber), i.e., a tuning rate of 750 cm^-1 V^-1middotperiod^-1 of the AR and the injector.

Keywords

electroluminescence; laser beams; laser transitions; laser tuning; laser variables measurement; optical design techniques; quantum cascade lasers; anticrossed diagonal transition; anticrossed injector ground; electroluminescence; laser active region; laser design technique; laser emission measurement; laser states; quantum cascade laser voltage tunability; Chemical lasers; Electroluminescence; Gas lasers; Laser theory; Laser transitions; Laser tuning; Optical design; Quantum cascade lasers; Tunable circuits and devices; Voltage; Quantum cascade (QC) lasers; Stark effect; tunable lasers;

fLanguage

English

Journal_Title

Quantum Electronics, IEEE Journal of

Publisher

ieee

ISSN

0018-9197

Type

jour

DOI

10.1109/JQE.2009.2013122

Filename

4957552