A vertical cavity surface emitting laser (VCSEL) has a shortened overall laser cavity by combining the gain section with a distributed Bragg reflector (DBR). The overall cavity length can be contracted by placing gain structures inside the DBR. This generally applies to a number of semiconductor material systems and wavelength bands, but this scheme is very well suited to the AlGaAs/GaAs material system with strained InGaAs quantum wells as a gain medium, for example.

A surface emitting laser having a wide wavelength tunable band is provided.

A surface emitting laser includes a first reflecting mirror (102); a second reflecting mirror (116); and an active layer (104) arranged between the first reflecting mirror (102) and the second reflecting mirror (116), a gap being formed between the second reflecting mirror (116) and the active layer (104), an oscillation wavelength being tunable. The second reflecting mirror (116) includes a beam (108) comprising a single-crystal semiconductor, and a dielectric multilayer film (110) supported by the beam (108), and the dielectric multilayer film (110) is arranged in an opening (118) formed in the beam (108).

A system includes a laser system having a master oscillator and a planar waveguide (PWG) amplifier having one or more laser diode pump arrays, a PWG pumphead, input optics, and output optics. The PWG pumphead is configured to receive a low-power optical beam from the master oscillator and generate a high-power optical beam. The PWG pumphead includes a laser gain medium, a cartridge, and a pumphead housing. The cartridge is configured to receive and retain the laser gain medium, and the cartridge includes one or more cooling channels configured to transport coolant in order to cool the laser gain medium. The pumphead housing is configured to receive and retain the cartridge, where the cartridge is removable from the housing.

A laser structure includes a substrate and a first dielectric layer formed on the substrate. A multi-quantum well is formed on the first dielectric layer and has a plurality of alternating layers. The alternating layers include a dielectric layer having a sub-wavelength thickness and a monolayer of a two dimensional material.

The present disclosure describes broadband optical emission sources that include a stack of semiconductor layers, wherein each of the semiconductor layers is operable to emit light of a different respective wavelength; a light source operable to provide optical pumping for stimulated photon emission from the stack; wherein the semiconductor layers are disposed sequentially in the stack such that a first one of the semiconductor layers is closest to the light source and a last one of the semiconductor layers is furthest from the light source, and wherein each particular one of the semiconductor layers is at least partially transparent to the light generated by the other semiconductor layers that are closer to the light source than the particular semiconductor layer. The disclosure also describes various spectrometers that include a broadband optical emission device, and optionally include a tuneable wavelength filter operable to allow a selected wavelength or narrow range of wavelengths to pass through.

An optical pump may include a polarization element to separate pump light into a first component beam and a second component beam, wherein the polarization element is to separate the pump light such that the first component beam has a first polarization and the second component beam has a second polarization that is different from the first polarization. The optical pump may include a gain medium to absorb a portion of the first component beam and a portion of the second component beam, and transmit an unabsorbed portion of the first component beam and an unabsorbed portion of the second component beam. The optical pump may include one or more optical elements to at least partially isolate a pump source from the unabsorbed portion of the first component beam and the unabsorbed portion of the second component beam.

Disclosed herein are embodiments of a vertical external cavity surface emitting laser (VECSEL) device that utilizes an external micromirror array, and methods of fabricating and using the same. In one embodiment, a VECSEL device includes a gain chip, a mirror, and a micromirror array. The gain chip includes a gain medium. The micromirror array includes a plurality of curved micromirrors. The micromirror array and the mirror define an optical cavity, and the micromirror array is oriented such that at least one of the curved micromirrors is to reflect light generated by the gain medium back toward the gain medium along a length of the optical cavity.

Disclosed herein are embodiments of a vertical external cavity surface emitting laser (VECSEL) device that utilizes an external micromirror array, and methods of fabricating and using the same. In one embodiment, a VECSEL device includes a gain chip, a mirror, and a micromirror array. The gain chip includes a gain medium. The micromirror array includes a plurality of curved micromirrors. The micromirror array and the mirror define an optical cavity, and the micromirror array is oriented such that at least one of the curved micromirrors is to reflect light generated by the gain medium back toward the gain medium along a length of the optical cavity.

A vertical external-cavity surface-emitting laser (VECSEL) whose blueshift is reduced also in a high intensity range of emitted laser light is realized. A surface-emitting device for VECSEL includes a base substrate made of GaN and c-axis oriented, and an emitter structure formed of a group 13 nitride semiconductor and provided on the base substrate. The emitter structure is formed of unit deposition parts, each of which is provided on the base substrate and includes a DBR layer having a distributed Bragg reflection structure and an active layer that has a multiple quantum well structure and generates excitation emission in response to irradiation with external laser light. A c-axis orientation of each of the unit deposition parts conforms to the c-axis orientation of the base substrate located directly below the unit deposition parts. Grooves are formed between the unit deposition parts.

A laser emitter is provided, including a substrate and a dielectric mask layer located proximate to and above the substrate in a thickness direction. The dielectric mask layer may have a plurality of trenches formed therein. The plurality of trenches may have a plurality of different respective widths. The laser emitter may further include a respective nanowire located within each trench of the plurality of trenches. Each nanowire may include a first semiconductor layer located above the substrate in the thickness direction. Each nanowire may further include a quantum well layer located proximate to and above the first semiconductor layer in the thickness direction. Each nanowire may further include a second semiconductor layer located proximate to and above the quantum well layer in the thickness direction.