Suppression of Side‐Etching in C 2 H 6 / H 2 / O 2 Reactive Ion Etching for the Fabrication of an InGaAsP / InP P‐Substrate Buried‐Heterostructure Laser Diode

A reactive ion etching (RIE) technique using a C 2 H 6 , H 2 , and O 2 mixture was applied to the fabrication of InGaAsP/InP P-substrate partially inverted buried heterostructure laser diodes, which have been commercially produced for their superior characteristics. The addition of O 2 suppressed side etching and made it possible to fabricate ridge mesa structures for the laser diodes with a height of 4 μm and a width of 1μm with superior controllability. The effects of O 2 addition were investigated by Auger electron spectroscopy and a mechanism suppressing side etching was examined