Widely Tunable III–V/Silicon Lasers for Spectroscopy in the Short-Wave Infrared

Abstract

Silicon photonics can provide ultra-compact and high-performance building blocks for integrated laser sources, such as micro-ring resonators, beam combiners and gratings. Integrating III-V gain material with silicon photonic integrated circuits enables the realization of advanced laser sources and fully integrated photonics systems for optical communication and sensing applications. The availability of III-V/silicon laser sources operating in the 2-2.5 µm shortwave infrared (SWIR) wavelength range is very valuable for spectroscopic sensing since many important industrial gases and blood glucose have absorption bands in this wavelength range. In this paper, first we present our latest results on heterogeneously integrated III-V-on-silicon distributed feedback (DFB) laser arrays. A III-V-on-silicon DFB laser array covering the 2.27-2.39 µm wavelength range with 6 nm wavelength spacing is reported. This DFB laser array is employed as the light source for tunable diode laser absorption spectroscopy of different gases. A four-channel DFB laser array integrated with a beam combiner is used to perform spectroscopic sensing over a 7nm spectral range without mode hopping at room temperature. Finally, we present our recent advances in widely tunable Vernier lasers based on heterogeneous integration and butt-coupling of the gain section. Continuous tuning near the absorption lines by thermally adjusting the laser cavity length enable highresolution TDLAS measurements together with wide wavelength coverage.

Monolithic Integration of Mid-Infrared Quantum Cascade Lasers and Frequency Combs with Passive Waveguides

“…The development of photonic integrated circuits (PICs) in the last decades has enabled high-speed optical transceivers and chip-scale photonic sensors. , On these platforms, the coupling of high-performance semiconductor lasers with low-loss passive waveguides is a vital step. Several approaches, including monolithic, − hybrid, and heterogeneous integration, have been employed to integrate lasers on InP and silicon-based PICs. These PICs can offer compact, low-loss, and high-quality factor laser feedback systems with a variety of filter components and enable novel solutions to realize advanced semiconductor laser sources.…”

Demonstration of Large Mode-Hop-Free Tuning in Narrow-Linewidth Heterogeneous Integrated Laser

“…Choosing the most efficient tuning effect depends on the material system and the laser configuration. Adjusting the wavelength of a distributed feedback (DFB) laser is typically done by controlling the current in the active section [28]. However, this can result in non-constant output power over the tuning range.…”

Numerical Investigation and Design of Electrically-Pumped Self-Pulsing Fano Laser Based on III-V/Silicon Integration

“…The generation of ultrashort pulses with high repetition rate has been realized with mode-locked laser diodes for the III-V type materials [6][7][8], but the passive waveguide loss on the III-V platform (3-4 dB/cm at 1550 nm) is larger than that of the silicon waveguide (0.7 dB/cm) [6,9], which limits the active-passive integration and device performance, such as the spectral linewidth, output power, etc. The III-V/Si hybrid pulsed laser [10][11][12][13] is, therefore, an alternative way, and ideally suited, for the integration with high-speed silicon modulators and germanium photodetectors to utilize the mature CMOS fabrication.…”