Absorber and gain chip optimization to improve performance from a passively modelocked electrically pumped vertical external cavity surface emitting laser

Abstract

We present an electrically pumped vertical-external-cavity surface-emitting laser (EP-VECSEL) modelocked with a semiconductor saturable absorber mirror (SESAM) with significantly improved performance. In different cavity configurations, we present the shortest pulses (2.5 ps), highest average output power (53.2 mW), highest repetition rate (18.2 GHz), and highest peak power (4.7 W) to date. The simple and low-cost concept of EP-VECSELs is very attractive for mass-market applications such as optical communication and clocking. The improvements result from an optimized gain chip from Philips Technologie GmbH and a SESAM, specifically designed for EP-VECSELs. For the gain chip, we found a better trade-off between electrical and optical losses with an optimized doping scheme in the substrate to increase the average output power. Furthermore, the device's bottom contact diameter (60 μm) is smaller than the oxide aperture diameter (100 μm), which favors electro-optical conversion into a TEM 00 mode. Compared to optically pumped VECSELs we have to increase the field enhancement in the active region of an EP-VECSEL which requires a SESAM with lower saturation fluence and higher modulation depth for modelocking. We therefore used a resonant quantum well SESAM with a 3.5-pair dielectric top-coating (SiNx and SiO2) to enhance the field in the absorber at the lasing wavelength of 980 nm. The absorption bandedge at room temperature is detuned (965 nm) compared to the resonance (980 nm), which enables temperature-tuning of the modulation depth and saturation fluence from approximately 2.5% up to 15% and from 20 μJ/cm2 to 1.1 μJ/cm2, respectively. © 2014 Author(s).