Continuous-wave operation of GaN based multi-quantum-well laser diode at room temperature

Room-temperature operation of cw GaN based multi-quantum-well laser diodes (LDs) is demonstrated. The LD structure is grown on a sapphire (0001) substrate by metalorganic chemical vapour deposition. A 2.5 mu m x 800 mu m ridge waveguide structure is fabricated. The electrical and optical characteristics of the laser diode under direct current injection at room temperature are investigated. The threshold current and voltage of the LD under cw operation are 110mA and 10.5V, respectively. Thermal induced series resistance decrease and emission wavelength red-shift are observed as the injection current is increased. The full width at half maximum for the parallel and perpendicular far field pattern (FFP) are 12 degrees and 32 degrees, respectively.

The junction temperature and forward voltage relationship of GaN-based laser diode

In GaAs-based light-emitting diode (LED) or laser diode (LD), the forward voltage (V) will decrease linearly with the increasing junction temperature (T). This can be used as a convenient method to measure the junction temperature. In GaN-based LED, the relationship is linear too. But in GaN-based LD, the acceptor M (g) in p-GaN material can not ionize completely at-room temperature, and the carrier density will change with temperature. But we find finally that, this change won't lead to a nonlinear relationship of V-T. Our experiments show that it is Linear too.

Analysis on the high luminous flux white light from GaN-based laser diode

We fabricated a phosphor-conversion white light using an InGaN laser diode that emits 445 nm and phosphor that emits in the yellow region when excited by the blue laser light. At 500 mA injection current the luminous flux and the luminous efficacy were 113 lm and 44 lm/W, respectively. The relationship of the luminous flux and the luminous efficacy of the white light with an injection current were discussed. Based on the evaluation method for luminous efficacy of light sources established by the Commission International de I'Eclairage (CIE) and the phosphor used in this experiment, a theoretical analysis of the experiment results and the maximum luminous efficacy of this white light fabrication method were also presented.

GaN-based violet laser diodes grown on free-standing GaN substrate

National Natural Science Foundation of China 60506001 60776047 60476021 60576003 60836003；National Basic Research Programme of China 2007CB936700

Near-diffraction-limited, 35.4 W laser-diode end-pumped Nd:YVO4 slab laser operating at 1342 nm

A diode stack end-pumped Nd:YVO4 slab laser at 1342 nm with near-diffraction-limited beam quality by using a hybrid resonator was presented. At a pump power of 139.5 W, laser power of 35.4 W was obtained with a conversion efficiency of 25.4% of the laser diode to laser output. The beam quality M-2 factors were measured to be 1.2 in the unstable direction and 1.3 in the stable direction at the output power of 29 W. (C) 2009 Optical Society of America

A laser-diode-pumped acoustic-optic Q-switched Nd:YVO4 slab laser with a hybrid resonator

A 32.1 W laser-diode-stack pumped acoustic-optic Q-switched Nd:YVO4 slab laser with hybrid resonator at 1064 nm was demonstrated with the pumping power of 112 W and repetition rate of 40 kHz, the pulse duration was 32.47 ns. The slope efficiency and optical-to-optical efficiency were 37 and 28.7%, respectively. At the repetition rate of 20 kHz and pumping power of 90 W, the average output power and pulse duration were 20.4 W and 20.43 ns, respectively. With the pumping power of 112 W, the beam quality M-2 factors in CW operation were measured to be 1.3 in stable direction and 1.6 in unstable direction.

Sinusoidal phase-modulating laser diode interferometer for measuring angular displacement

We propose a sinusoidal phase-modulating laser diode interferometer for measuring small angular displacement. The interferometer is based on a Fabry-Perot plate. It has a simple structure and is insensitive to external disturbance. Sinusoidal phase-modulating interferometry is used for improving the measurement accuracy. A charge-coupled device (CCD) image sensor is used for measuring the distance between the reflected beams from two faces of the Fabry-Perot plate. From the distance, the initial angle of incidence is calculated. Compared with Michelson interferometers and autocollimators, this interferometer has the advantage of compact size and simple structure. The numerical calculation and experimental results verify the usefulness of this novel interferometer. (C) 2004 Society of Photo-Optical Instrumentation Engineers.

Measurement of thermal rise-time of a laser diode based on spectrally resolved waveforms

Thermal resistance and thermal rise-time are two basic parameters that affect most of the performances of a laser diode greatly. By measuring waveforms received after a spectroscope at wavelengths varied step-by-step, the spectrally resolved waveforms can be converted to calculate the thermal rise-time. Basic formulas for the spectrum variation of a laser diode and the measurement set-up by using a Boxcar are described in the paper. As an example, the thermal rise-time of a p-side up packaged short-pulse laser diode was measured by the method to be 390 mu s. The method will be useful in characterizing diode lasers and LID modules in high-power applications. (c) 2005 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Intensity-modulating characteristics of a laser diode subjected to optical injection

We have found that the optical power of a laser diode (LD) does not change with the injected light intensity that is modulated when its injection current is at some specific values. The amplitude of optical power change of the LD varies periodically with the increase of the injection current. It is made clear through theoretical analysis that these phenomena are caused by gain compression and interband carrier absorption of the LD that depend on longitudinal mode competition, bandgap-shrinkage effects, thermal conduction, and so on. Our experimental results make it easy to eliminate optical power change of LDs. We only need to choose a proper value of the injection current. (c) 2005 Optical Society of America.

Simple ABCD matrix method for evaluating optical coupling system of laser diode to single-mode fiber with a lensed-tip

In this paper, we present a simple technique to determine the coupling efficiency between a laser diode and a lensed-tip based on the ABCD transformation matrix method. We have compared our analysis technique to that of previous work and have found that the presented method is reliable in predicting the coupling efficiency of lensed-tip and has the advantage of simplicity of coupling efficiency calculation even by a pocket calculator. The results can be useful for designing coupling optics. (c) 2005 Elsevier GmbH. All rights reserved.

Measurement of the wavefront of a laser diode system for intersatellite communication by a Jamin double-shearing interferometer

The frame of a laser diode transmitter for intersatellite communication is concisely introduced. A simple, novel and visual method for measuring the diffraction-limited wavefront of the transmitter by a Jamin double-shearing interferometer is proposed. To verify the validity of the measurement, the far-field divergence of beam is additionally rigorously analysed in terms of the Fraunhofer diffraction. The measurement, the necessary analyses and discussion are given in detail. By directly measuring the fringe widths and quantitatively interpreting the interference fringes, the minimum detectable wavefront height (DWH) of the wavefront is only 0.2 gimel (the distance between the perfect plane wavefront and the actual wavefront at the transmitting aperture) and the corresponding divergence is only 65.84 mu rad. This indicates that the wavefront approaches the diffraction-limited condition. The results show that this interferometer is a powerful tool for testing the semiconductor laser beam's wavefront, especially the diffraction-limited wavefront.

Laser diode array side-pumped acousto-optic induced unidirectional operation Q-switched Nd : YAG slab ring laser

A laser-diode array (LDA) side-pumped Nd:YAG slab ring laser is described that incorporates a prism-shaped acousto-optic modulator to enforce unidirectional operation and Q-switching. When pumped by the maximum power of 50 W, Q-switched energies of 3.6 mJ and 50 ns duration, corresponding to a peak power of 72 kW, are obtained. (C) 1999 Society of Photo-Optical Instrumentation Engineers. [S0091-3286(99)01306-9].

5.5W CWYb3+ : Y2O3 ceramic laser pumped with 970 nm laser diode

CW laser output has been demonstrated for polycrystalline transparent 10 at.% Yb3+-doped Y2O3 ceramics. End-pumped with 970 nm laser diode, a maximum output power of 5.5 W has been obtained with absorbed pump power of 31.1 W. The slope efficiency is 25% while the threshold pump power is 5.6 W. Saturation is not observed in our experiments, indicating higher laser output can be expected with higher pump power. (C) 2004 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.