Fabrication of disk droplets and evaluation of their lasing action

Disk resonators are difficult to create with droplets, since they self-form spheres due to the surface tension. In this study, disk (cylindrical) droplets were created by enclosing a dye (rhodamine 6G) solution in silicone rubber. Lasing actions of these droplets were examined by pulsed green laser excitation. In a large droplet (2 mm diameter), the whispering gallery mode emission was difficult to attain, since it competed with the radial or axial modes that made a round trip in the droplet. A disk droplet of 150 μm diameter exhibited a comb-like spectrum of the whispering gallery mode resonant emission.