Dual-wavelength mode-locking of novel chirped multilayer quantum-dot lasers

Abstract

Monolithic passively mode-locked lasers are investigated based on chirped multilayer InAs/InGaAs QDs. Three chirped wavelengths, with stacking numbers of 2, 3 and 5 layers, are designed with capped InGaAs thickness of 4, 3 and 1 nm, respectively. The ridge-waveguide devices of 5-mu m width and 3-mm length are fabricated to have absorber-to-gain length ratio of 1:9. A curve tracer is used to analyze the hysteresis on the light-current curve. Two kinks in the L-I curve are observed at threshold current near 50 mA and at higher current of about 150 mA. The lasing wavelength just above threshold is centered at 1268 nm and the RF spectrum of mode-locking is peaked at 13.32 GHz. At well above threshold of 200 mA, another RF peak at 13.21 GHz occurs that corresponds to shorter lasing wavelength around 1233 nm. The two lasing wavelengths are originated from ground-state transitions of two groups of InAs/InGaAs QDs. Simultaneous dual-wavelength mode-locking is therefore achieved at rather low forward current and low reverse bias by incorporating this novel design of QD structure.