Self-suspended Single-mode Microdisk Lasers

Abstract

Miniature semiconductor lasers have attracted a large amount of interest owing to their potential as highly integrated components in photonic circuits or in sensors. Particularly, microdisk lasers exploiting whispering gallery modes have been regarded as an important candidate because of their relatively small footprint and low threshold. However, it has been challenging for microdisk to operate under single mode operation and to lase in a preselected mode. We report subwavelength microdisk resonators suspended in air with connecting bridges and propose a simple method using the number and symmetry of bridges to enhance or reduce wave confinement in the whispering gallery cavity. Moreover, a suitable choice of bridges increases the quality factor of microdisks compared to microdisks resonator without bridges. Using this method, we demonstrate single mode lasing of preselected modes at telecommunication wavelength.Over the past few years, small-scale lasers have attracted a widespread attention with potential applications in several areas including health, 1,2 defense, 3 and quality control, 4 to name a few.Recent advances made in photonics, both in understanding physical phenomena 5,6 and in controlling fabrication processes, 7,8 have contributed to improved lasers robustness 9 and size. 10,11