Polarization Control in High Peak Power, High Brightness VCSEL

A new VCSEL design is presented to achieve high output power and high brightness with a strong selection of a linear polarization state in high speed pulsing operation. Higher output power is achieved by including multiple gain segments in tandem, in the gain region. To achieve single mode operation with high output power, an extended cavity three reflector design is presented. High degree of polarization selectivity is achieved by a linear grating deployed with the third reflector, such that lasing is allowed only in a preferred linear polarization state. A polarization selective reflector including a linear grating is designed to impart strong polarization selectivity for a preferred linear polarization state. The polarization selective reflector used as the third reflector in an extended cavity VCSEL device, exhibits strong polarization selection for a preferred linear polarization state during high speed pulsing including in the gain switching resonance regime.