Room Temperature InP DFB Laser Array Directly Grown on (001) Silicon

TL;DR

This paper presents a novel selective area growth technique enabling the direct epitaxial growth of high-performance InP-based DFB laser arrays on silicon, overcoming lattice mismatch issues for integrated photonics.

Contribution

It introduces a new epitaxial method that suppresses defects, allowing room-temperature InP laser arrays on silicon suitable for scalable photonic integration.

Findings

Demonstrated room-temperature InP DFB laser array on silicon

Achieved high uniformity and yield in laser fabrication

Suppressed dislocations and boundaries to less than 20nm

Abstract

Fully exploiting the silicon photonics platform requires a fundamentally new approach to realize high-performance laser sources that can be integrated directly using wafer-scale fabrication methods. Direct band gap III-V semiconductors allow efficient light generation but the large mismatch in lattice constant, thermal expansion and crystal polarity makes their epitaxial growth directly on silicon extremely complex. Here, using a selective area growth technique in confined regions, we surpass this fundamental limit and demonstrate an optically pumped InP-based distributed feedback (DFB) laser array grown on (001)-Silicon operating at room temperature and suitable for wavelength-division-multiplexing applications. The novel epitaxial technology suppresses threading dislocations and anti-phase boundaries to a less than 20nm thick layer not affecting the device performance. Using an in-plane laser cavity defined by standard top-down lithographic patterning together with a high yield and high uniformity provides scalability and a straightforward path towards cost-effective co-integration with photonic circuits and III-V FINFET logic.