Investigation of the physical mechanisms governing the performance of OEIC-compatible p-i-n active region lateral injection lasers

The lateral p-i-n structure, in which the heavily-doped p- and n- regions, are used to contact an intrinsic active region is an important class of lateral injection lasers. An analytical model was used to investigate the p-i-n junction under moderate injection. The resulting physical insights point to possible solutions to the past poor performance of this class of optoelectronic devices. The use of strain-compensated quantum wells to equalize the carrier mobilities, the introduction of `current guide' regions above and below the quantum wells to form hybrid lateral-vertical injection structures and smooth out the lateral gain profile, and the implementation of `diffusion profile engineering' to position the junctions were investigated.