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Optics Letters

Optically induced hysteresis in a two-state quantum dot laser

Bogusław Tykalewicz, David Goulding, Stephen P. Hegarty, G. Huyet, Дубинкин Илья Николаевич, N. Fedorov, Thomas Erneux, Evgeny A. Viktorov, Bryan Kelleher

Published Feb 26, 2016• 28 citations
Publisher

Abstract

Quantum dot lasers can lase from the ground state only, simultaneously from both the ground and first excited states and from the excited state only. We examine the influence of optical injection at frequencies close to the ground state when the free-running operation of the device is excited state lasing only. We demonstrate the existence of an injection-induced bistability between ground state dominated emission and excited state dominated emission and the consequent hysteresis loop in the lasing output. Experimental and numerical investigations are in excellent agreement. Inhomogeneous broadening is found to be the underlying physical mechanism driving the phenomenon.

DOI
10.1364/ol.41.001034

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Quantum dot lasers can lase from the ground state only, simultaneously from both the ground and first excited states and from the excited state only. We examine the influence of optical injection at frequencies close to the ground state when the free-running operation of the device is excited state lasing only. We demonstrate the existence of an injection-induced bistability between ground state dominated emission and excited state dominated emission and the consequent hysteresis loop in the lasing output. Experimental and numerical investigations are in excellent agreement. Inhomogeneous broadening is found to be the underlying physical mechanism driving the phenomenon.
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The behaviour of a dual state quantum dot laser undergoing optical injection is analysed. Depending on the injection current the free-running operation of the slave can be ground state only emission, both ground state and excited state emission or excited state emission only. Complete suppression of the excited state in the dual state lasing regime via sufficiently strong optical injection of the ground state is presented. Injection induced switching between two longitudinal modes of the ground state is also presented in the ground state only regime.
We analyze theoretically nonlinear dynamics of an optically injected two-mode quantum dot laser lasing simultaneously from the ground and excited states. We show that although the external optical signal is injected into the ground-state mode alone, it can lead to the generation of regular picosecond pulses and pulse packages in the intensity of the excited-state mode. Generation of regular streams of picosecond pulses is attributed to an intrinsic gain switching mechanism where the relaxation time is modulated by the oscillations in the occupation of the ground and excited energy states.
Summary form only given. We report results of an experiment in which the output of a single-mode diode laser is injected into a diode laser amplifier operated close to its lasing threshold. The injected light is periodically modulated at frequencies very slow compared with the relevant relaxation frequencies within the amplifier. In contrast to most experiments, we operate the amplifier in a reflection mode instead of the transmission mode. Under the influence of the periodic modulation, the amplifier output exhibits several novel types of hysteresis and associated bistable behavior.
Observation of optical bistability in a two-section InAs/InP quantum dash laser is reported. The hysteresis in the optical power-injection current (L-I) characteristics is found to vary with the absorber reverse bias condition. A reverse bias of −0.8 (0) V to the saturable absorber, a hysteresis of 32 (24) mW is measured when the injection current through the gain section is swept forward and backward. Moreover, the bistability is further affirmed through investigation of the lasing emission spectra at specific operating points.
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