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High-power directional emission from microlasers with chaotic resonators
1C. Gmachl, F. Capasso, J. Faist, D. L. Sivco, and A. Y. Cho are at Bell Laboratories, Lucent Technologies, 600 Mountain Avenue, Murray Hill, NJ 07974, USA. E. E. Narimanov and A. D. Stone are in the Department of Applied Physics, Yale University.
Abstract:
High-power and highly directional semiconductor microcylinder lasers based on an optical resonator with deformed cross section are reported. In the favorable directions of the far-field, a power increase of up to three orders of magnitude over the conventional circularly symmetric lasers was obtained. A "bow-tie"-shaped resonance is responsible for the improved performance of the lasers in the higher range of deformations, in contrast to "whispering-gallery"-type modes of circular and weakly deformed lasers. This resonator design, although demonstrated here in midinfrared quantum-cascade lasers, should be applicable to any laser based on semiconductors or other high-refractive index materials.