VERY-LOW-THRESHOLD, STRAINED INYGA1-YAS-GAAS QUANTUM-WELL LASERS DEFINED BY IMPURITY-INDUCED DISORDERING

Strained In(y)Ga1-yAs-GaAs quantum-well (In-GaAs-QW) stripe geometry lasers (lambda approximately 9050 angstrom) were fabricated by impurity-induced disordering (IID) through self-aligned Si-Zn diffusion. Lasers exhibit very low threshold (I(th) = 3.0 mA at room-temperature continuous operation) and good uniformity ( > 90% with I(th) < 8 mA, > 70% with I(th) = 4 +/- 1 mA). The moderate blue shift of the lasing wavelength (250 angstrom or 40 meV) suggests that the strained InGaAs-QW active layer can survive long-time high-temperature thermal annealing (850-degrees-C, 8 h) required for Si diffusion. We believe that IID by Si diffusion is a very attractive approcah for the fabrication of strained In(y)Ga1-yAs-QW stripe geometry lasers, at least for y less-than-or-equal-to 0.25.