FABRY-PEROT LASERS

The Fabry-Perot laser is conceptually just an LED with a pair of end mirrors.
The mirrors are needed to create the right conditions for lasing to occur. In practice
of course it is somewhat more complex than this - but not a lot. The Fabry-Perot
laser gets its name (and its operational principle) from the fact that its cavity acts
as a Fabry-Perot resonator

Fabry-Perot
Filter.
Light
enters the cavity through a
partially silvered mirror on the left
and leaves it through a partially
silvered mirror on the right. Only
wavelengths that resonate within
the cavity are able to pass
through. Other wavelengths are
strongly attenuated.

To understand the operation of the Fabry-Perot laser it is first necessary

to understand the Fabry-Perot filter. The principle of the Fabry-Perot filter is
illustrated in Figure 66. When you put two mirrors opposite one another they
form a resonant cavity. Light will bounce between the two mirrors. When the
distance between the mirrors is an integral multiple of half wavelengths, the
light will reinforce itself. Wavelengths that are not resonant undergo
destructive interference with themselves and are reflected away.
This principle also applies in the FP laser although the light is emitted
within the cavity itself rather than arriving from outside.
In some sense every laser cavity is a Fabry-Perot cavity. But when the
cavity is very long compared to the wavelength involved we get a very large
number of resonant wavelengths all of which are very close together. So the
important filtering characteristics of the Fabry-Perot cavity are lost.
We consider a laser to be Fabry-Perot when it has a relatively short
cavity (in relation to the wavelength of the light produced). Wavelengths
produced are related to the distance between the mirrors by the following
formula:

Where: = Wavelength

Cl = Length of the cavity

x = An arbitrary integer - 1, 2, 3, 4...
n = Refractive index of active medium

This is an extremely simple relationship. Notice here that the only other
variable in the equation is the refractive index of the gain medium (dielectric) in the
cavity. This is because we always quote the wavelength as what it would be if the
wave was travelling in a vacuum. 51 Since the speed of propagation in the cavity is a
lot lower than c (the speed of light) the wavelength is a lot shorter than it would be
in free space. The adjustment factor is the refractive index.
51

A wavelength of 1500 nm in free space becomes a real physical distance of

1500/3.45 nm in InP which equals 434.78 nm.

In practice, we cant make the laser so short that we restrict it to only one
wavelength. We need some space for stimulated emission to amplify the signal and
we are limited by the density of the power we can deliver to a small area. Typically
the cavity length is between 100 and 200 microns (of the order of 400 wavelengths
or so) although devices with cavities as short as 30 microns have been made. 1.490
1.494 1.497 1.5 1.503 1.507 1.510 Wavelength (nm)1.490 1.491 1.494 1.495 1.497
1.498 1.5 1.502 1.503 1.505 1.507 1.508 1.510

Resonance Examples
The Figures above shows two examples of typical resonances. On the left we
have solved the equation above for a cavity 100 microns long, a wavelength of
1500 nm and a refractive index of 3.45 (InP). We can see that there are 7
wavelengths within 10 nm of 1500 nm where resonance may occur. On the right of
the figure we can see the same solution but for a cavity 200 microns long. Here
there are 13 possible resonant wavelengths. The longer the cavity (and the shorter
the wavelength) the more resonant wavelengths we can find within the vicinity of
our centre wavelength.

Resonance Modes in the Cavity of a Fabry-Perot Laser

Figure above (on the left) illustrates the principle of multiple resonant
longitudinal modes in the FP cavity. We can get a number of resonant wavelengths
provided the cavity length is an integer multiple of the particular wavelength.
On the right of the figure we see another problem. What if the sides of the
cavity reflect light. What you get here are lateral modes forming which are also
resonant and which can also lase! There are various ways of minimising or
eliminating these lateral modes and this is discussed later. Transverse modes
(vertical paths) cannot exist because the device is too thin in the vertical direction
for multiple modes to exist. You could get a lateral mode that was completely sideto-side at right angles to the long axis of the device. You could also get a vertical
one of the same kind. However, lateral modes are suppressed as discussed later
and there is not enough gain in the vertical direction for lasing to be sustainable.

Modes

Produced in a
Typical Fabry-Perot Laser

DISTRIBUTED FEEDBACK (DFB) LASERS

DFB Laser
Schematic

When we want to use lasers for long distance communication we find

that standard FP lasers have significant problems:
1. As seen above FP lasers produce many wavelengths over a
spectral width of between 5 and 8 nm. Even if we are using
the 1310 zero dispersion band or dispersion shifted fibre
in the 1550 nm band there will still be some chromatic
dispersion of the signal caused by dispersion being slightly
different at the different wavelengths.

2. The mode hopping behavior of FP lasers gives rise to Mode

Partition Noise as described in 2.4.3, Mode Partition Noise
on page 67.
3. In Wavelength Division Multiplexed (WDM) systems we want
to carry many multiplexed optical signals on the same fibre.
To do this it is important for each signal to have as narrow a
spectral width as possible and to be as stable as possible.
Regular FP lasers have too great a spectral width for use in
this application.
Distributed FeedBack (DFB) lasers are one answer to this problem. The
idea is that you put a Bragg grating into the laser cavity of an index-guided
FP laser. This is just a periodic variation in the RI of the gain region along its
length.52 The presence of the grating causes small reflections to occur at
each RI change (corrugation). When the period of the corrugations is a
multiple of the wavelength of the incident light, constructive interference
between reflections occurs and a proportion of the light is reflected. Other
wavelengths destructively interfere and therefore cannot be reflected. The
effect is strongest when the period of the Bragg grating is equal to the
wavelength of light used (first order grating). However, the device will work
when the grating period is any (small) integer multiple of the wavelength.
Thus only one mode (the one that conforms to the wavelength of the grating)
can lase.
Early devices using this principle had the grating within the active
region and were found to have too much attenuation. As a result the grating
was moved to a waveguide layer immediately adjacent to (below) the cavity.
The evernescent field accompanying the light wave in the cavity extends into
the adjacent layer and interacts with the grating to produce the desired
effect.
In principle a DFB laser doesnt need end mirrors. The grating can be
made strong enough to produce sufficient feedback (reflection) for lasing to
take place. However, in a perfect DFB laser there are actually two lines
produced (one at each side of the Bragg wavelength). We only want one line.
A way of achieving this and improving the efficiency of the device is to place
a high reflectance end mirror at one end of the cavity and either an AR
coating or just a cleaved facet at the output end. In this case the grating
doesnt need to be very strong - just sufficient to ensure that a single mode
dominates. The added reflections (from the end mirrors) act to make the
device asymmetric and suppress one of the two spectral lines. Unfortunately
they also act to increase the linewidth.
A schematic view of a DFB laser is shown in Figure 77 on page 113.
DFB lasers are very effective and widely used but they have a problem with
chirp. There are two main sources of chirp:

1. When the current is switched on the charge carrier (electron

and hole) flux in the cavity changes very rapidly. This causes a
change in the refractive index. A change in refractive index (of
course) changes the resonant wavelength of the grating and
the wavelength of the laser output changes (typically the
wavelength gets longer) in well less than a single bit time.
2. During lasing the cavity heats up. This also happens very
quickly (in a lot less than a bit time). This heating has two
principal effects:
a. It causes the RI of the cavity to change.
b. It changes the electron energy gap in the material.
In an FP laser (as distinct from a DBR or DFB laser) this change in the
energy gap dominates other effects and is the predominant cause of
chirp. In the DFB laser the energy gap change is irrelevant. This is
because the energy gap covers a range of energies and the DFB
resonant wavelength is determined by the grating spacing and the
cavity RI. So long as the range of energies in the gap extends to cover
the resonant wavelength then the device will lase.
This means that a DFB laser will chirp
far less than an FP laser. This is because
chirp in DFB lasers is caused by the effect of
the change in RI. This effect is much smaller
than the effect caused by the change in the
energy gap (which dominates in FP lasers but
doesnt affect DFBs).
Sometimes DFB lasers are constructed with a quarter-wave phase shift in the
middle section of the grating as shown in Figure 78. This phase shift introduces a
sharp transmission fringe into the grating reflection band. The fringe acts to
narrow the linewidth of the laser significantly.

Phase Shifted Grating - Reflection Spectrum

Figure 79 shows the reflective characteristics of an unshifted and a

shifted Bragg grating structure. Ascending values on the y-axis represent
increasing percentage of reflection. The x-axis represents wavelength. The
axes have not been scaled because the numerical values depend on the
period and strength of the grating itself. The phase shifted case (on the right
of the figure) shows that a narrow passband exists in the middle of the

reflection band. This is caused by the quarter-wave phase shift. What

happens is that the reflected waves from each end of the grating will be out
of phase with each other and hence will destructively interfere.
DFB lasers have a number of significant advantages over FP types:
1. They can exhibit very narrow linewidths (of the order of 50
kHz).
2. They have quite low chirp as discussed above.
3. They typically have a very low Relative Intensity Noise (RIN).
Nothing however is completely without problems:
1. DBR lasers are extremely sensitive to reflections.
Any reflection entering the cavity will disturb the lasers stable
resonance. This causes a widening of the linewidth. To the
extent that reflections returning from the outside vary (see
2.4.4, Reflections and Return Loss Variation on page 67) this
can also be a significant source of noise. To minimise the
effects of this problem DFB lasers are often packaged with an
isolator integrated within the assembly. However, these dont
always suppress all reflections and additional steps must be
taken in system design to minimise the problem.
2. They are sensitive to temperature variations in two ways:
a. The stable (average) temperature of the device has a
very strong influence on wavelength. Wavelength
variation on a scale of many seconds or longer doesnt
have much detrimental effect on a single channel long
distance communication system but it is a critical issue
in
WDM
systems.
The device requires temperature control for stable
operation. This is usually provided by including a Peltier
Effect cooler in the laser package.
b. During transmission (in even one bit time) the cavity
heats up. If a long series of 1 bits are transmitted this
can cause a significant wavelength shift on a time scale
too short to be compensated by the Peltier cooler. This
introduces a requirement that higher layer link protocols
be balanced and spend (on average) as much time in
the 0 state as in the 1 state.
3. Varying conditions produce significant fluctuations in laser
output power. This is undesirable for many reasons. To counter
this a PIN diode is often included in the laser package near the
back facet. This diode picks up a small proportion of
generated light from the transmittance of the back facet and

provides input to a feedback loop for control of laser drive

current.
4. They have a relatively high cost. As seen above, to get stable
operation you almost always need temperature control, power
control and optical isolation. All this adds to the cost.
VERTICAL CAVITY SURFACE EMITTING LASERS (VCSELS)
VCSELs55(also called microlasers) have been around in various forms since
the late 1970s. However in 1991 there was a major development in construction
techniques reported and in 1996 the first commercial devices became available.

It seems almost too obvious but when you build a laser you cant just
arbitrarily decide on its structure. You are severely limited by material
characteristics and available manufacturing technology. In previous sections
we have discussed edge emitting lasers where you start with a flat substrate
and use the techniques of chip manufacture to build a very thin, flat device
that nevertheless has a relatively large area. VCSELs are different. Instead of
emitting from the edge they emit from the surface. They are constructed by
laying down a very large number (perhaps 500) of relatively thin layers of
semiconductor material. The device emits light vertically through the stack
of material layers. This is shown in Figure 92. As in any laser the overall
structure is one of two end mirrors on each side of an active region which
produces the light. The key points are as follows:

The mirrors are made of alternating layers of

material of different refractive indices with carefully
controlled thickness. The stack forms a Bragg grating
(see 5.7, Diffraction Gratings on page 206) which is
a wavelength-selective mirror.
The sides of the laser are formed by cutting the
material out.
The laser dimensions can be such that no lateral
modes are possible. In fact the laser is so confined
that it forms a quantum well in which light behaves
as individual photons rather than as waves or rays.
Typical dimensions are about 12 microns in diameter
(for single moded operation) and 20 microns (for
multimoded operation). Experimental devices have
been made and shown to operate with a diameter of
only 3 microns.
The active region is very short compared to other
types of semiconductor laser. This means that the
mirrors have to have a relatively high reflectivity.
(You need many passes through the amplifying

VCSEL

medium to get enough amplification to sustain

lasing.)
One of the big challenges is supplying power to the
active region because it must pass through many
mirror layers (junctions) first. This problem however
has been solved.

Structure

The operational characteristics of VCSELs combine many of the

desirable properties of lasers and LEDs.

Typical coupled output power at present is somewhere around

a milliwatt. This is very good for LAN type communications as
we only want to transmit up to a maximum power of the (class
1)
eye
safety
limit
(-4
dBm).
Typical LEDs are a lot lower in power and require the use of
expensive InGaAs pin diode receivers. VCSELs in the LAN
environment can work well with simple, low cost Si diode
receivers.
Current VCSELs on the market offer one of two possible
wavelengths: 980 nm or 850 nm. Again this is in the high
attenuation window for glass fibre but quite adequate for
distances of around 500 metres or less.
VCSELs with a large diameter (20 microns or so) have multiple
transverse modes. This makes the device very suitable for use
with
multimode
fibre.
The big problem for lasers with multimode fibre is modal noise
as discussed in 2.3.6, Modal Noise on page 51. The low
coherence of output light produced by a multi-transverse mode
VCSEL leads to insensitivity to mode selective loss and
minimises the problem of modal noise.
A low divergence circular light beam is produced which allows
for easy and efficient coupling to a fibre.

Typical VCSELs have very low threshold currents (less than 5

mA). Very low power dissipation and low modulation current
requirements mean that special driver circuitry is not required.
VCSELs have very high modulation bandwidths (2.4 GHz has
been demonstrated). This is well in excess of what can be
achieved with much more expensive LEDs.
Devices are very stable and generally do not need a monitor
photodiode or feedback power control as is conventionally
needed for most communications lasers and high-end LEDs.

In 1998 four manufacturers have low priced VCSELs on the market. In

the near future we could see them replacing LEDs completely for the LAN
communications environment.