Improving the sulfur loading in cathodes is a significant challenge for practical lithium−sulfur batteries. Although carbonaceous sulfur hosts can achieve higher sulfur content and loading, the low tap densities of carbonaceous materials lead to low volumetric energy densities, restricting practical application. Here, conductive porous laminated vanadium nitride (VN) as a carbon-free sulfur host has been successfully developed to construct high tap density, high sulfur loading, and high energy density sulfur electrodes. The laminated stacking multiscale VN featuring interconnected holes possesses high storage space for sulfur loading, achieving high sulfur loading and utilization. VN@S materials' sulfur content and tap density can achieve 80 wt % and 1.17 g cm −3 , respectively. At the sulfur loading of 1.0 mg cm −2 , the VN@S cathode reaches the reversible capacity of 790 mAh g −1 at 1 C after 200 cycles and 145.2 mAh g −1 at 15 C after 500 cycles. Precisely, at a high sulfur loading of 12.6 mg cm −2 , the VN@S cathode delivers a reversible capacity of 518.8 mAh g −1 (485.6 mAh cm −3 ) at 0.1 C after 100 cycles.
International audienceThe modulation response of quantum-dot (QD) lasers is studied. Based on a set of four rate equations, a new analytical modulation transfer function is developed via a small-signal analysis. The transfer function can clearly describe the impacts of the wetting layer and the excited states: finite carrier capture and carrier relaxation times as well as the Pauli blocking limits the modulation bandwidth. The definitions of the resonance frequency and the damping factor of QD lasers are also improved. From the analysis, it is demonstrated that carrier escape from the ground state to the excited states leads to a nonzero resonance frequency at low bias powers associated to a strong damping factor
International audienceThis paper investigates the modulation properties of self-injected quantum-dot semiconductor lasers. Using a semianalytical approach, the modulation characteristic of a quantumdot nanostructure laser operating under the influence of optical feedback is successfully modeled. This novel approach derives a feedback induced modulation response model based on the incorporation of the specific quantum nanostructure carrier dynamics as well as the effects of nonlinear gain. This work investigates the impacts of the carrier capture and relaxation time as well as other material parameters such as linewidth enhancement factor, differential gain and gain compression factor for different feedback configurations. It is also shown that, under the short external cavity configuration, the dynamic properties such as the relaxation frequency as well as the laser's bandwidth can be improved through controlled optical feedback. On the other hand, numerical results show that under the long external cavity configuration, any small back-reflection from the laser's facets combined with the large variations of linewidth enhancement factor would significantly alter the laser's modulation response
A practical and accurate method to obtain the index of refraction, especially the decrement δ, across the carbon 1s absorption edge is demonstrated. The combination of absorption spectra scaled to the Henke atomic scattering factor database, the use of the doubly subtractive Kramers-Kronig relations, and high precision specular reflectivity measurements from thin films allow the notoriously difficult-to-measure δ to be determined with high accuracy. No independent knowledge of the film thickness or density is required. High confidence interpolation between relatively sparse measurements of δ across an absorption edge is achieved. Accurate optical constants determined by this method are expected to greatly improve the simulation and interpretation of resonant soft x-ray scattering and reflectivity data. The method is demonstrated using poly(methyl methacrylate) and should be extendable to all organic materials.
International audienceThe modulation dynamics and the linewidth enhancement factor of excited-state (ES) lasing quantum dot (QD) semiconductor lasers are investigated through a set of improved rate equation model, in which the contribution of off-resonant states to the refractive index change is taken into account. The ES laser exhibits a broader modulation response associated with a much lower chirp-to-power ratio in comparison with the ground-state (GS) lasing laser. In addition, it is found that the laser emission in ES reduces the linewidth enhancement factor of QD lasers by about 40% than that in GS. These properties make the ES lasing devices, especially InAs/InP ones emitting at 1.55 μm, more attractive for direct modulation in high-speed optical communication systems
In semiconductor lasers, current injection not only provides the optical gain, but also induces variation of the refractive index, as governed by the Kramers-Krönig relation. The linear coupling between the changes of the effective refractive index and the modal gain is described by the linewidth broadening factor, which is responsible for many static and dynamic features of semiconductor lasers. Intensive efforts have been made to characterize this factor in the past three decades. In this paper, we propose a simple, flexible technique for measuring the linewidth broadening factor of semiconductor lasers. It relies on the stable optical injection locking of semiconductor lasers, and the linewidth broadening factor is extracted from the residual side-modes, which are supported by the amplified spontaneous emission. This new technique has great advantages of insensitivity to thermal effects, the bias current, and the choice of injection-locked mode. In addition, it does not require the explicit knowledge of optical injection conditions, including the injection strength and the frequency detuning. The standard deviation of the measurements is less than 15%.
We present an experimental investigation on the period-one dynamics of an optically injected InAs/GaAs quantum dot laser as a photonic microwave source. It is shown that the microwave frequency of the quantum dot laser's period-one oscillation is continuously tunable through the adjustment of the frequency detuning. The microwave power is enhanced by increasing the injection strength providing that the operation is away from the Hopf bifurcation, whereas the second-harmonic distortion of the electrical signal is well reduced by increasing the detuning frequency. Both strong optical injection and high detuning frequency are favorable for obtaining a single sideband optical signal. In addition, particular period-one oscillation points of low sensitivity to the frequency detuning are found close to the Hopf bifurcation line.
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