IR-emitting room-temperature nanowire lasers are based on gallium arsenide

Nov. 18, 2013
Acton, Australia—Researchers at the Australian National University have created what they say are the first room-temperature lasers from aluminum gallium arsenide (AlGaAs)-based nanowires.
When lasing, a gallium arsenide based nanowire produces interference characteristic of two coherent dipole emitters (corresponding to the nanowire ends), leading to this interference pattern. (Image: Australian National University)


Acton, Australia—Researchers at the Australian National University have created what they say are the first room-temperature lasers from aluminum gallium arsenide (AlGaAs)-based nanowires.1 Nanowire lasers emitting in the UV or visible regions have previously been developed, but IR-emitting nanowire lasers are more difficult to create due to issues such as Auger recombination.

Dhruv Saxena, the lead author of the group’s paper in Nature Photonics, notes that conventional IR-emitting laser diodes are bulky and require many processing steps to produce a good cavity and mirrors. Nanowires are much easier to fabricate; in addition they are minuscule in size, leading to potential benefits such as 3D integration.

Optically pumped
"We have a substrate covered in gold particles which act as catalysts, or seeds," says Sudha Mokkapati, one of the researchers. "We provide gases containing gallium and arsenic and raise the temperature of the substrate up to 750°C. At these temperatures the elements react and nanowires start growing."

"The substrate provides the direction of the [crystal] growth, so they grow straight up, standing vertically on the substrate instead of growing in random directions," says Saxena. The researchers produced nanowires with a GaAs/AlGaAs/GaAs core-shell-cap structure, paying attention to the material quality as well as the design of the nanowires’ Fabry-Perot laser cavities. The lasers are optically pumped; ultimately, electrical pumping would be an advantage for use in optical integrated circuits.

Potential uses of the nanowire lasers include optical communications, spectroscopy, and medical diagnosis.

REFERENCE:

1. Dhruv Saxena et al., Nature Photonics (2013); doi: 10.1038/nphoton.2013.303


Sponsored Recommendations

Advancing Neuroscience Using High-Precision 3D Printing

March 7, 2025
Learn how Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory Used High-Precision 3D Printing to Advance Neuroscience Research using 3D Printed Optical Drives.

From Prototyping to Production: How High-Precision 3D Printing is Reinventing Electronics Manufacturing

March 7, 2025
Learn how micro 3D printing is enabling miniaturization. As products get smaller the challenge to manufacture small parts increases.

Sputtered Thin-film Coatings

Feb. 27, 2025
Optical thin-film coatings can be deposited by a variety of methods. Learn about 2 traditional methods and a deposition process called sputtering.

What are Notch Filters?

Feb. 27, 2025
Notch filters are ideal for applications that require nearly complete rejection of a laser line while passing as much non-laser light as possible.

Voice your opinion!

To join the conversation, and become an exclusive member of Laser Focus World, create an account today!