Complete polarisation control of GaAs gain-guidedtop-surface emittingvertical cavity lasers

Abstract

Complete polarisation control is demonstrated in circular gain-guided top-surface emitting vertical cavity lasers by etching a line near the cavity aperture. The etch orientation determines the dominant polarisation state of emission by modifying the spontaneous emission coupling into each polarisation state. This is sufficient to pin the polarisation in monomode and multimode devices.