Printed Nanolaser on Silicon

Abstract

We propose and demonstrate a direct integration of a wavelength-scale III–V nanolaser onto a silicon-on-insulator (SOI) waveguide. By employing high-precision microtransfer printing techniques, with an optimally designed photonic crystal nanolaser structure, we experimentally achieved a coupling efficiency of 83% between the InGaAsP nanobeam laser and the SOI waveguide. Our III–V nanobeam laser is designed as an asymmetric one-dimensional photonic crystal cavity, which allows unidirectional coupling to the combined III–V nanobeam waveguide with high efficiency. Through the compact vertical coupler in the region where the III–V and SOI waveguides overlap at the optimal length of 3.2 μm, 88% of the light from the printed III–V nanolaser can theoretically be coupled to a vertically integrated SOI waveguide.