Design and Characteristics of Photonic Crystal Resonators for Surface-Emitting Quantum Cascade Lasers

Abstract

We present our recent development of the surface-emitting quantum cascade laser with a PC (photonic crystal) resonator and a strain-compensated MQW (multiple quantum well) active layer operating at around 4.3 μm. We describe the laser performance mainly from the viewpoint of the design and analysis of the PC resonators, which include both numerical calculations by FEM (finite element method) and analytical calculations using the k·p perturbation theory and group theory. We analyze the resonance quality factor, overlap factor, extraction efficiency, and far-field pattern, and show how the output power and beam quality have been improved by the appropriate design of the PC resonator.

Keywords

• quantum cascade laser
• photonic crystal resonator
• quality factor
• extraction efficiency
• finite element method
• <b>k</b>·<b>p</b> perturbation