High-power spectrally-stable DBR semiconductor lasers designed for pulsing in the nanosecond regime

Abstract

The basic design considerations for a spectrally-stable DBR semiconductor laser specifically designed for pulsing in the nanosecond regime is presented, along with test results from devices fabricated according to these design parameters. Results show excellent mode selection and spectral stability over an extremely large range of conditions, including temperature ranges of 15-60°C and peak drive current ranges from threshold to 880 mA. These lasers exhibit peak output powers of greater than 500 mW for DBR semiconductor lasers at 976 nm and 1064 nm while remaining spectrally stable. Chirp data shows the chirp can be effectively tuned from approximately 1 GHz to greater than 20 GHz by varying the pulse width and peak drive current.