Fabrication, optimization, and characterization of monolithic semiconductor mode-locked lasers and colliding, pulse mode-locked lasers at millimeter-wave frequencies

This work reports on the fabrication, optimisation and characterisation of monolithic mode-locked lasers (MLLs) and colliding-pulse mode-locked (CPM) lasers with repetition rate in the range 10-60 GHz. The devices consist of double section split-contact ridge waveguide lasers fabricated in GaAs/AlGaAs double quantum well (DQW) material. For CPM devices, the saturable absorber section was fabricated with a coplanar ground-signal-ground (G-S-G) pad structure. The optimum saturable absorber size for efficient mode-locking is found experimentally. The fabricated devices are characterised in terms of operating regimes (Continuous Wave, Self-Pulsation, Mode-Locking) and the mode-locking signals were observed in the frequency domain using an external fast photodiode. In the case of CPM devices a mm-wave signal could also be extracted directly from the saturable absorber section of the laser using a microwave probe.