http://ab-initio.mit.edu/~oskooi/papers/Oskooi10.pdf

Meep: A flexible free-software package for electromagnetic simulations by the FDTD method

Plasmon lasers can operate at dimensions well below the diffraction limit. Their small size promises uses in nanophotonic circuits and for other size-critical applications. The demonstration of a sub-diffraction-limited plasmon laser with low losses, which enables its room-temperature operation, takes a significant step towards realizing the potential of these lasers.

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Room-temperature sub-diffraction-limited plasmon laser by total internal reflection

Organic dyes have been used as gain medium for lasers since the 1960s, long before the advent of today’s organic electronic devices. Organic gain materials are highly attractive for lasing due to their chemical tunability and large stimulated emission cross section. While the traditional dye laser has been largely replaced by solid-state lasers, a number of new and miniaturized organic lasers have emerged that hold great potential for lab-on-chip applications, biointegration, low-cost sensing and related areas, which benefit from the unique properties of organic gain materials. On the fundamental level, these include high exciton binding energy, low refractive index (compared to inorganic semiconductors), and ease of spectral and chemical tuning. On a technological level, mechanical flexibility and compatibility with simple processing techniques such as printing, roll-to-roll, self-assembly, and soft-lithography are most relevant. Here, the authors provide a comprehensive review of the developments in the...

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Organic Lasers: Recent Developments on Materials, Device Geometries, and Fabrication Techniques

http://ieeexplore.ieee.org/iel5/5/31325/01456922.pdf

An introduction to optical waveguides

Nanolasers generate coherent light at the nanoscale. In the past decade, they have attracted intense interest, because they are more compact, faster and more power-efficient than conventional lasers. Thanks to these capabilities, nanolasers are now an emergent tool for a variety of practical applications. In this Review, we explain the intrinsic merits of nanolasers and assess recent progress on their applications, particularly for optical interconnects, near-field spectroscopy and sensing, optical probing for biological systems and far-field beam synthesis through near-field eigenmode engineering. We highlight the scientific and engineering challenges that remain for forging nanolasers into powerful tools for nanoscience and nanotechnology.

Applications of nanolasers.

The finite-difference time domain (FDTD) technique and the Pade approximation with Baker's algorithm are used to calculate the mode frequencies and quality factors of cavities. Comparing with the fast Fourier transformation/Pade method, we find that the Pade approximation and the Baker's algorithm can obtain exact resonant frequencies and quality factors based on a much shorter time record of the FDTD output.

/pdf/computation-of-resonant-frequencies-and-quality-factors-of-4kda7q97k9.pdf

Computation of resonant frequencies and quality factors of cavities by FDTD technique and Pade approximation

We demonstrate silicon nitride mode-division multiplexing (MDM) and wavelength-division multiplexing (WDM) using asymmetrical directional couplers and microring resonators. Our experiments reveal three-mode multiplexing and demultiplexing. We demonstrate 30Gb/s open eye diagrams with an extinction ratio of ~9 dB for each of the three modes. We observe the worst-case modal crosstalk of ~-10 dB. Our analysis of the measured transmission spectra suggests three contributions to the observed crosstalks, with the dominant cause being a compromised input-coupling at the directional couplers in the multiplexer.

Silicon nitride three-mode division multiplexing and wavelength-division multiplexing using asymmetrical directional couplers and microring resonators.

Mode coupling between the whispering-gallery modes (WGMs) is numerically investigated for a two-dimensional microdisk resonator with an output waveguide. The equilateral-polygonal shaped mode patterns can be constructed by mode coupling in the microdisk, and the coupled modes can still keep high quality factors (Q factors). For a microdisk with a diameter of 4.5 microm and a refractive index of 3.2 connected to a 0.6-microm-wide output waveguide, the coupled mode at the wavelength of 1490 nm has a Q factor in the order of 10(4), which is ten times larger than those of the uncoupled WGMs, and the output efficiency defined as the ratio of the energy flux confined in the output waveguide to the total radiation energy flux is about 0.65. The mode coupling can be used to realize high efficiency directional-emission microdisk lasers.

/pdf/investigation-of-mode-coupling-in-a-microdisk-resonator-for-45icrib78l.pdf

Investigation of mode coupling in a microdisk resonator for realizing directional emission.

Modes in square resonators are analyzed and classified according to the irreducible representations of the point group C/sub 4v/. If the mode numbers p and q that denote the number of wave nodes in the directions of two orthogonal square sides are unequal and have the same even-odd characteristics, the corresponding double modes are accidentally degenerate and can be combined into two new distributions with definite parities relative to the square diagonal mirror planes. The distributions with odd parities belong to the whispering-gallery-like modes in square resonators. The mode frequencies and quality factors are also calculated by the finite-difference time-domain technique and Pade/spl acute/ approximation method. The numerically calculated mode frequencies agree with the theoretical ones very well and the whispering-gallery-like modes have quality factors much higher than other modes, including their accidentally degenerate counterparts in square resonators.

Modes in square resonators

InP/GaInAsP square-resonator microlasers with an output waveguide connected to the midpoint of one side of the square are fabricated by standard photolithography and inductively-coupled-plasma etching technique. For a 20-mu m-side square microlaser with a 2-mu m-wide output waveguide, cw threshold current is 11 mA at room temperature, and the highest mode Q factor is 1.0 X 10(4) measured from the mode linewidth at the injection current of 10 mA. Multimode oscillation is observed with the lasing mode wavelength 1546 nm and the side-mode suppression ratio of 20 dB at the injection current of 15 mA. (C) 2008 Optical Society of America

/pdf/directional-emission-inp-gainasp-square-resonator-1fko5g9bwe.pdf

Yong-Zhen Huang

Papers

Computation of resonant frequencies and quality factors of cavities by FDTD technique and Pade approximation

Silicon nitride three-mode division multiplexing and wavelength-division multiplexing using asymmetrical directional couplers and microring resonators.

Investigation of mode coupling in a microdisk resonator for realizing directional emission.

Modes in square resonators

Directional emission InP/GaInAsP square-resonator microlasers.