THEORETICAL AND EXPERIMENTAL INVESTIGATION OF IV-VI MID-IR MQW VCSELs

Mid-infrared section of the optical spectrum is
typically between 3 to 30 m wavelengths. This area
represents optical absorption of a wide range of
chemical and organic compounds. Mid-IR absorption
spectroscopy is one of the known highly accurate
chemical analyses. There are several requirements
for the light source used in such techniques.
Thermal stability, tunability, monochromaticity, and
sufficient power output are a few vital elements of
such a system. Lead salt lasers are one of the known
sources for mid-infrared light. They can cover 2.9
to 27 m wavelength. The main difficulty of lead
salts is their poor thermal conductivity. This
prevents the traditional edge-emitting laser to
operate continuously (i.e. CW mode) at room
temperature. CW mode is a necessary condition, since
any spectral analysis needs a light source with
minimum harmonics. To this date, the highest
temperature CW mid-IR available is around 223K,
which is still well below thermoelectric cooling
range (i.e.~260K). The main goal of this research is
to assist the development of an innovative light
source that can be installed in a portable optical
spectroscopy unit.

Autorentext
Shahriar earned his BSc in applied nuclear physics from Shiraz
University, Iran and PhD in optoelectronics from University of
Oklahoma. He was a research associate and principal investigator
at the Center for Quantum Devices of Northwestern University,
Evanston, IL. He is now working as an electromagnetic
effects/lightning engineer at Boeing.