An all-silicon laser based on silicon nanocrystals with high optical gains

• Published in: Science bulletin Vol. 63; no. 2; pp. 75 - 77
• Main Authors: Wang, Dong-Chen, Zhang, Chi, Zeng, Pan, Zhou, Wen-Jie, Ma, Lei, Wang, Hao-Tian, Zhou, Zhi-Quan, Hu, Fei, Zhang, Shu-Yu, Lu, Ming, Wu, Xiang
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Netherlands Elsevier B.V 30.01.2018
• Subjects: 复合激光;硅;光电探测器;Si;光波导;光调节;低效率;相容性
• ISSN: 2095-9273; 2095-9281
• DOI: 10.1016/j.scib.2018.01.006

Silicon （Si） has become the most promising material for monolithic integrated photonic circuits with a wide range of scientific and industrial applications. A variety of Si photonic components, such as optical waveguides, optical modulators and photodetectors, have been successfully demonstrated, however, silicon lasers have not yet been achieved due to the low efficiency of Si emission. In 2000, Pavesi et al. [1] reported the first observation of optical gains in Si nanocrystals （Si NCs）, but the realization of an all-Si laser using these Si NCs that have low gains and broadband emission is a great challenge. Although the fabrication of matured III-V compound lasers on Si substrates was proposed to avoid this challenge [2,3], the development of all-Si lasers is still in high demand for integrated Si photonics, due to the better compatibility with modern Si techniques.