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Electrically pumped continuous-wave III–V quantum dot lasers on silicon

Nature Photonics volume 10, pages 307–311 (2016)Cite this article

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Abstract

Reliable, efficient electrically pumped silicon-based lasers would enable full integration of photonic and electronic circuits, but have previously only been realized by wafer bonding. Here, we demonstrate continuous-wave InAs/GaAs quantum dot lasers directly grown on silicon substrates with a low threshold current density of 62.5 A cm–2, a room-temperature output power exceeding 105 mW and operation up to 120 °C. Over 3,100 h of continuous-wave operating data have been collected, giving an extrapolated mean time to failure of over 100,158 h. The realization of high-performance quantum dot lasers on silicon is due to the achievement of a low density of threading dislocations on the order of 105 cm−2 in the III–V epilayers by combining a nucleation layer and dislocation filter layers with in situ thermal annealing. These results are a major advance towards reliable and cost-effective silicon-based photonic–electronic integration.

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Figure 1: Development and advantages of QD lasers.
Figure 2: Epitaxial growth and structural characterization of QD lasers.
Figure 3: Fabricated III–V laser directly grown on a silicon substrate.
Figure 4: Silicon laser performance characterization.

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Acknowledgements

The authors acknowledge financial support from the UK Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (grants nos. EP/J012904/1 and EP/J012815/1). H.L. thanks The Royal Society for funding his University Research Fellowship.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Electronic and Electrical Engineering, University College London, London, WC1E 7JE, UK

    Siming Chen, Jiang Wu, Qi Jiang, Mingchu Tang, Alwyn J. Seeds & Huiyun Liu

  2. Department of Electronic and Electrical Engineering, University of Sheffield, Sheffield, S1 3JD, UK

    Wei Li & Ian Ross

  3. Department of Physics and Astronomy, Cardiff University, Queens Building, The Parade, Cardiff, CF24 3AA, UK

    Samuel Shutts, Stella N. Elliott, Angela Sobiesierski & Peter M. Smowton

Authors
  1. Siming Chen
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  2. Wei Li
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  3. Jiang Wu
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  4. Qi Jiang
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  5. Mingchu Tang
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Contributions

H.L. proposed and guided the overall project with contributions from A.J.S. and P.M.S. S.C., J.W., A.J.S., P.M.S. and H.L. developed the laser structure. J.W., M.T. and H.L. performed material growth. S.C. and Q.J. carried out the device fabrication and device characterization. S.S., S.N.E. and P.M.S. performed laser near-field measurements and analysis. A.S. and S.S. contributed to the development of device processing. W.L. and I.R. performed TEM characterization and analysis. M.T. and J.W. carried out AFM characterization. S.C., J.W., A.J.S. and H.L. composed the manuscript with input from all co-authors.

Corresponding authors

Correspondence to Siming Chen or Huiyun Liu.

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Chen, S., Li, W., Wu, J. et al. Electrically pumped continuous-wave III–V quantum dot lasers on silicon. Nature Photon 10, 307–311 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1038/nphoton.2016.21

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