The spin-flip model of spin-polarized vertical-cavity surface-emitting lasers: asymptotic analysis, numerics, and experiments

TL;DR

This paper analyzes the steady-state behavior of spin-polarized vertical-cavity surface-emitting lasers using asymptotic methods, confirming results with numerics and experiments, and revealing stability characteristics of solutions.

Contribution

It develops an asymptotic analysis of the spin-flip model for these lasers, providing new insights into the stability of steady states under elliptic pump polarization.

Findings

One steady-state solution is generally stable.

The other steady-state solution is generally unstable.

Analytical results agree qualitatively with experimental data.

Abstract

The spin-flip model describing optically pumped spin-polarized vertical-cavity surface-emitting lasers is considered. The steady-state solutions of the model for elliptically-polarised fields are studied. Asymptotic analysis for the existence and stability of the steady-state solutions is developed, particularly in the presence of pump polarisation ellipticity. The expansion is with respect to small parameters representing the ellipticity and the difference between the total pump power and the lasing threshold. The analytical results are then confirmed numerically, where it is obtained that generally one of the steady-state solutions is stable while the other is not. The theoretical results are shown to be in qualitative agreement with the experiments.