IEEE PHOTONICS TECHNOLOGY LETTERS, VOL. 25, NO.

9, MAY 1, 2013

859

Voltage and Current Modulation at 20 Gb/s of a

Transistor Laser at Room Temperature
Rohan Bambery, Student Member, IEEE, Fei Tan, Milton Feng, Fellow, IEEE,
John M. Dallesasse, Senior Member, IEEE, and Nick Holonyak, Jr., Life Fellow, IEEE

Abstract Data are presented showing open-eye 20-Gb/s transmission for a quantum-well transistor laser operating at room
temperature (25 C). The fast spontaneous recombination lifetime
(30 ps) in the base region results in a resonance-free frequency
response allowing demonstration of 20-Gb/s transmission with
an I/ITH = 3. It is shown that higher temperature hastens the
transition to the first excited state and improves bandwidth and
eye-opening at low bias levels (I/ITH = 2). In addition, room
temperature 20-Gb/s transmission through voltage modulation
of a transistor laser via intracavity photon-assisted tunneling in
the base-collector junction is reported.
Index Terms 20-Gb/s modulation, high speed, laser, photonassisted tunneling, transistor, voltage modulation.

I. I NTRODUCTION

HE BASE current in a transistor (minority carrier recombination) separates the low-impedance base input from
the high-impedance collector output and holds the key to
device operation [1]. In direct-bandgap semiconductors radiative carrier recombination has been leveraged to design light
emitting diodes (LEDs) [2] and, with the incorporation of
a cavity to confine the photons and achieve coherent light
output, diode lasers (DLs) [3], [4]. With further advances
in crystal growth, quantum-well DLs [5], [6] and verticalcavity surface-emitting lasers (VCSELs) [7], [8] have been
realized. Previously, we have reported record performance of
high-speed, high current density, sub-micron heterojunction
bipolar transistors (HBTs) [9], [10]. By inserting a quantum
well into the base of the HBT, trading off electrical gain for
optical generation, and fabricating a high-Q cavity, we have
demonstrated a high performance quantum-well heterojunction
bipolar transistor laser (QW-HBTL) [11], [12]. A device has
been reported previously [13] that can either operate as a twoport diode laser or a transistor in the forward active mode,
however, not both simultaneously.

Manuscript received October 18, 2012; revised February 5, 2013; accepted

March 6, 2013. Date of publication March 15, 2013; date of current version
April 16, 2013. This work was supported in part by the Army Research Office
under Grant W911NF-12-1-0469. The work of N. Holonyak, Jr. was supported
by the Sony Corporation under the John Bardeen Endowed Chairmanship of
Electrical and Computer Engineering and Physics.
The authors are with the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Urbana, IL 61801 USA
(e-mail: bambery2@illinois.edu; feitan1@illinois.edu; mfeng@illinois.edu;
jdallesa@illinois.edu; nholonya@illinois.edu).
Color versions of one or more of the figures in this letter are available
online at http://ieeexplore.ieee.org.
Digital Object Identifier 10.1109/LPT.2013.2252887

The transistor laser (TL) has been demonstrated with: roomtemperature continuous wave operation [14], fast spontaneous
recombination lifetime (< 25ps) [15], bandfilling and voltage modulation via intracavity photon-assisted tunneling [16],
[17], signal mixing via a tunnel junction [18], resonancefree high frequency operation [19], collector feedback control
of laser power [20], and simultaneous 20 Gb/s electrical
and optical transmission at low temperature [21]. Recently,
low temperature operation of a vertical-cavity surface-emitting
transistor laser (VCTL) has also been demonstrated [22].
Analytical modeling of the transistor laser has been discussed
in [23] however, this falls short in agreeing with measured data
of fabricated devices, specifically with regards to the low-bias
resonance peak in the RF response. This is attributed to usage
of inaccurate parameters in the model.
In this letter 20 Gb/s data transmission is demonstrated
using a transistor laser operating in the range of 15 C
to 25 C. For the first time 20 Gb/s operation by using
the intracavity photon- assisted tunneling process to control
the laser output is reported. This is achieved by modulating
the collector voltage (VCE ). The role of temperature on the
transition of the laser to the first excited state (E0 E1 ,
0 1 , 0 > 1 ) and its effect on device bandwidth and
eye-opening at low bias currents are discussed.
II. T RANSISTOR L ASER E PITAXIAL S TRUCTURE
AND FABRICATION
The epitaxial crystal structure of the device described here
begins with a heavily doped n-type 5000 GaAs buffer grown
on SI-GaAs. It is followed by a 5000 n-type Al0.95 Ga0.05 As
layer that functions as both the sub-collector and as the laser
lower cladding layer providing transverse optical mode confinement. A 200 heavily-doped n-type GaAs layer functions
as the collector contact layer. A 120 In0.49 Ga0.51 P etch
stop layer is included for facilitating fabrication followed by
a 600 lightly-doped GaAs collector. A 1000 heavilydoped p-type AlGaAs/InGaAs/GaAs layer serves as the base
and includes one 120 undoped InGaAs quantum well
designed for 980nm emission. The emitter is a lightly-doped
n-type 250 In0.49 Ga0.51 P layer followed by 4000 of
n-type oxidizable Al0.950.99 Ga0.050.01 As that performs as
the upper cladding and serves (via lateral oxidation [24]) to
confine the current injection in the active area. The emitter
contact is a 1000 heavily-doped n-type GaAs layer. Device
fabrication of the HBTL consists of 9 photolithographic steps,

1041-1135/$31.00 2013 IEEE

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IEEE PHOTONICS TECHNOLOGY LETTERS, VOL. 25, NO. 9, MAY 1, 2013

(a)

(b)

Fig. 1. False color SEM of a 400 m-long transistor laser. (a) Base current
modulated. (b) Collector voltage-modulated transistor laser configuration.
White boxes on inset schematics: bias tees.

including three wet etches, a lateral oxidation to reduce the

active emitter width to 1 m, 3 contact metallizations, BCB
planarization to facilitate post interconnection followed by a
final polyimide via interconnection to realize the common
emitter HBTL structure. The wafer is lapped to a thickness
of 25 m, polished and cleaved into bars 400 m in length.
These are mounted to indium-coated copper heatsinks that are
attached to the temperature-controlled measurement stage by a
silver-based thermal paste. Fig. 1 shows a false color scanning
electron microscope (SEM) photomicrograph of the fabricated
transistor laser used in this letter. The inset schematics illustrate (a) base current modulation and (b) collector voltage
modulation for 20 Gb/s transistor laser operation.
III. H IGH -S PEED M EASUREMENT A PPARATUS AND
C URRENT M ODULATION DATA
A Newport 3150 TEC is used to maintain temperature at
the copper mounting stage approximately 5 mm from the
active device. The light output from the device is collected
and collimated by a high NA aspheric lens and coupled
into a 50-m-core Corning multi-mode fiber mounted on a
custom-designed 5-axis high-precision stage. Fig. 2 shows the
collector IC -VCE and optical L-VCE characteristics. The shift
from spontaneous to stimulated operation is indicated by beta
compression in the IC -VCE family of curves and is caused by a
reduction in the minority-carrier lifetime (B ) in the base. The
fine structure also reveals the laser transitioning from E0
E1 (blue); the 1st excited state operation resulting in further
reduction of the carrier lifetime and a corresponding increase
in bandwidth. The device exhibits a threshold of 30 mA at
20 C which drops to 27.5 mA at 15 C and rises to 35 mA at
25 C. The minimum current for the state transition I0 1 =
45 mA which rises to 55 mA at 15 C and drops to 40 mA
at 25 C.
A 43.2 Gb/s Agilent 81250 ParBERT is used to generate the
20 Gb/s NRZ 27 -1 PRBS signal with 0.5 VPP voltage swing
used for TL characterization. The signal is fed into the base
port through a HP 11612B 50 GHz bias network and GSG
probe. The probe fiber is coupled into a high speed (25 GHz)
New Focus 1414 photodetector. The photodetector output is
amplified by a 40 Gb/s Picosecond Pulse Labs Series 5882
RF amplifier before being captured by an Agilent 86100C

Fig. 2. 1-m emitter width oxide-aperture QWTL (L = 400 m) with I B =

IT H = 30 mA at 20 C. (a) Collector IC -VCE characteristics exhibiting gain
compression owing to shift from base spontaneous (I B = IT H ) to stimulated
recombination and (b) single-facet laser optical L-VCE characteristics (I B >
I T H ) with the optical power shifting in energy, and sharply in amplitude, from
E0 , 0 1000 nm, to E1 , 1 970 nm. The solid circles represent the
bias points for the eye diagram and RF analyses. Inset: schematic illustrating
the Intracavity Photon Assisted Tunneling process in the BC junction that is
responsible for decreasing the light output at higher bias voltages.

high-speed sampling oscilloscope using a 50 GHz Agilent

86117A receiver module. Fig. 3 shows RF optical bandwidth
for 1525 C with eye diagrams at 15 and 25 C. The bias
conditions are as follows: i) 15 C; IB = 90mA; VCE = 1.75 V,
ii) 20 C; IB = 90mA; VCE = 1.6 V. iii) 25 C; IB = 90mA;
VCE = 1.5 V. The bias points are chosen based upon the
L-VCE family of curves to track the highest light output. The
RF optical bandwidth corresponding to the three bias points
is i) 14.5 GHz, ii) 13.7 GHz, iii) 11.8 GHz. Bandwidth is
reported directly from 3-port s-parameter data acquired by
a calibrated Agilent E8364B PNA. The light is collected
identical to the eye diagram measurement and the amplifier
is attached to port-3 of the PNA. The f 3d B bandwidth is
read off directly from S32 (port 2 is the base input) after a
moving average is used to smooth out the data. The device
demonstrates clean, open-eye operation at 20 Gb/s up to 25 C.
Modulation bandwidth is proportional to the square root of
(I/ITH 1), thus we use the ratio I/ITH to quantify modulation
efficiency. The I/ITH ratio at 90 mA is 3 for the given
temperatures and is much lower than that reported for all
current-generation diode lasers including VCSELs and CLs
[25], [26]. The fast recombination lifetime B in the base of the
TL is a consequence of the tilted-charge transport dynamics
and is critical for achieving high-speed.
We have observed that the transition to the first excitedstate (blue region in L-VCE curves of Fig. 4) occurs at a
lower base current at higher temperature. The E1 state results
in a faster B and as a result the device can be operated
at a higher frequency [27]. Fig. 5 shows the RF optical

BAMBERY et al.: VOLTAGE AND CURRENT MODULATION OF A TRANSISTOR LASER

861

Fig. 3. (Current modulation) Measured S32 data for base optical port
response at IB = 90 mA, at T = 15 C, 20 C, and 25 C. Inset: corresponding
open and clear 20-Gb/s eye diagrams at T = 15 C and 25 C.

(a)

(b)

Fig. 4. Side-by-side L -VCE characteristics of the device at (a) 15 C

and (b) 25 C showing the earlier onset of the first excited state at higher
temperature. Solid circles: bias points at 70 mA and 1.5 V.

Fig. 6. (Voltage modulation) Clear and open optical channel eye diagrams
with a 0.5 Vpp 20-Gb/s NRZ 27 -1 PRBS signal applied to the collector
terminal at T = 15 C, 20 C, and 25 C. IB and VCE bias points are indicated
for each diagram.

optical bandwidth S32 corresponding to the three bias points

is i) 7.7 GHz, ii) 9.0 GHz, iii) 10.5 GHz. The resonance-free
response and excited-state bandwidth increase of the transistor
laser allow for 20 Gb/s transmission at low bias levels.
IV. VOLTAGE M ODULATION FOR DATA T RANSMISSION

Fig. 5. (Current modulation) Measured S32 data for base optical port
response at IB = 70 mA, VCE = 1.5 V at T = 15 C, 20 C, and
25 C showing an increase of the RF optical bandwidth with temperature
due to excited-state operation. Inset: corresponding 20-Gb/s eye diagrams at
T = 15 C and 25 C showing closed eye at lower temperature and open eye
at higher temperature.

bandwidth for 1525 C with eye diagrams at 15 and 25 C.

The bias condition is set to IB = 70 mA; VCE = 1.5 V which
results in the device operating in the E0 state at 15 C but
in the E1 state at 25 C. The device is capable of open
eye transmission at 25 C with the same 20 Gb/s signal at
I/ITH = 2. The corresponding eye diagram at 15 C is closed
due to the delayed onset of the first excited state. The RF

The phenomenon of photon-assisted tunneling has been

discussed previously [16], [17] and arises due to the band
bending in the BC depletion region. As illustrated in Fig. 2,
as VCE is increased VCB increases causing the tilt in the energy
bands to be more pronounced. Since the electron wavefunction
can tunnel into the valence band, the energy required for an
upward transition to the conduction band is less than Eg .
A photon from the laser cavity can therefore trigger a tunneling event by causing the generation of an electron hole
pair. The photon absorption increases in magnitude with VCE
(= VCB + VBE ), manifest as a drop in light output in the
L-VCE characteristics and a corresponding increase in collector
current in the IC -VCE family. With sufficient VCE it is possible
to reduce the photon density below threshold, turning off the
laser. Here, it is shown that this voltage modulation of the
laser is indeed practical for high-speed data transmission. The
device is biased as follows: i) 15 C; IB = 90 mA; VCE =
1.75 V, ii) 20 C; IB = 90 mA; VCE = 1.6 V. iii) 25 C;
IB = 90 mA; VCE = 1.55 V. Fig. 6 shows clear, open
eye diagrams for all temperatures by applying the data signal
from the ParBERT to the collector port. The eye S/N ratio
is 8 at 20 C. The measured optical modulation bandwidth

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IEEE PHOTONICS TECHNOLOGY LETTERS, VOL. 25, NO. 9, MAY 1, 2013

S31 from the PNA for each bias condition is i) 13.4 GHz
ii) 12.7 GHz iii) 12.2 GHz for the different temperatures. The
ability to selectively modulate the transistor laser either by
current (conventional recombination) or by voltage (intracavity
photon-assisted tunneling) arises from the unique three port
structure of the TL and offers a flexible choice for high-speed
photonic integrated circuit design.
V. C ONCLUSION
In conclusion, 20 Gb/s open-eye data transmission by the
transistor laser up to 25 C at a 90 mA bias corresponding
to I/ITH 3 has been demonstrated. By exploiting the effect
of temperature on the transition to the first excited state
we obtain 20 Gb/s open-eye transmission at I/ITH = 2 and
25 C. Additionally, 20 Gb/s data transmission in the range of
1525 C using voltage modulated operation by applying
the input signal to the collector port is reported. The TL
offers a choice of both voltage and current modulation for
high data rate transmission; combined with the resonancefree small-signal optical response this provides compelling
evidence for the TL to meet the demands of future highbandwidth, low power, short-haul optical communication
systems.
ACKNOWLEDGMENT
The authors would like to thank the shop staff at Electrical
and Computer Engineering and Physics for assistance in
constructing a stable measurement system. The authors would
also like to thank Dr. M. Gerhold of the Army Research Office.
N. Holonyak, Jr. would like to thank J. Bardeen, Chair (Sony)
of ECE, and M. Feng for support.
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