Stochastic polarization switching induced by optical injection in bimodal quantum-dot micropillar lasers
Abstract
Mutual coupling and injection locking of semiconductor lasers is of great interest in non-linear dynamics and its applications for instance in secure data communication and photonic reservoir computing. Despite its importance, it has hardly been studied in microlasers operating at μW light levels. In this context, vertically emitting quantum dot micropillar lasers are of high interest. Usually, their light emission is bimodal, and the gain competition of the associated linearly polarized fundamental emission modes results in complex switching dynamics. We report on selective optical injection into either one of the two fundamental mode components of a bimodal micropillar laser. Both modes can lock to the master laser and influence the non-injected mode by reducing the available gain. We demonstrate that the switching dynamics can be tailored externally via optical injection in very good agreement with our theory based on semi-classical rate equations.
Citation
Schlottmann , E , Schicke , D , Krüger , F , Lingnau , B , Schneider , C , Höfling , S , Lüdge , K , Porte , X & Reitzenstein , S 2019 , ' Stochastic polarization switching induced by optical injection in bimodal quantum-dot micropillar lasers ' , Optics Express , vol. 27 , no. 20 , pp. 28816-28831 . https://doi.org/10.1364/OE.27.028816
Publication
Optics Express
Status
Peer reviewed
ISSN
1094-4087Type
Journal article
Rights
Copyright © 2019 Optical Society of America under the terms of the OSA Open Access Publishing Agreement. . This is the final published version of the work, which was originally published at https://doi.org/10.1364/OE.27.028816
Description
Funding: European Research Council (ERC) under the European Union’s Seventh Framework ERC Grant Agreement No.615613 and from the German Science Foundation (DFG) via the collaborative research center CRC787, CRC910 and GRK1558. BL acknowledges funding by the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG, German Research Foundation) – 404943123.Collections
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