Low-threshold optically pumped lasing in highly strained germanium nanowires

作者：Bao Shuyu; Kim Daeik; Onwukaeme Chibuzo; Gupta Shashank; Saraswat Krishna; Lee Kwang Hong; Kim Yeji; Min Dabin; Jung Yongduck; Qiu Haodong; Wang Hong; Fitzgerald Eugene A; Tan Chuan Seng^*; Nam Donguk^*

来源：Nature Communications, 2017, 8(1): 1845.

DOI：10.1038/s41467-017-02026-w

The integration of efficient, miniaturized group IV lasers into CMOS architecture holds the key to the realization of fully functional photonic-integrated circuits. Despite several years of progress, however, all group IV lasers reported to date exhibit impractically high thresholds owing to their unfavourable bandstructures. Highly strained germanium with its fundamentally altered bandstructure has emerged as a potential low-threshold gain medium, but there has yet to be a successful demonstration of lasing from this seemingly promising material system. Here we demonstrate a low-threshold, compact group IV laser that employs a germanium nanowire under a 1.6% uniaxial tensile strain as the gain medium. The amplified material gain in strained germanium can sufficiently overcome optical losses at 83 K, thus allowing the observation of multimode lasing with an optical pumping threshold density of similar to 3.0 kW cm(-2). Our demonstration opens new possibilities for group IV lasers for photonic-integrated circuits.

• 出版日期2017-11-29
• 单位MIT; 南阳理工学院