Engineered far-fields of metal-metal terahertz quantum cascade lasers with integrated planar horn structures

Abstract

ReuseUnless indicated otherwise, fulltext items are protected by copyright with all rights reserved. The copyright exception in section 29 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988 allows the making of a single copy solely for the purpose of non-commercial research or private study within the limits of fair dealing. The publisher or other rights-holder may allow further reproduction and re-use of this version -refer to the White Rose Research Online record for this item. Where records identify the publisher as the copyright holder, users can verify any specific terms of use on the publisher's website. TakedownIf you consider content in White Rose Research Online to be in breach of UK law, please notify us by emailing eprints@whiterose.ac.uk including the URL of the record and the reason for the withdrawal request. Abstract:The far-field emission profile of terahertz quantum cascade lasers (QCLs) in metalmetal waveguides is controlled in directionality and form through planar horn-type shape structures, whilst conserving a broad spectral response. The structures produce a gradual change in the high modal confinement of the waveguides and permit an improved far-field emission profile resulting in a four-fold increase in the emitted output power. The twodimensional far-field patterns are measured at 77 K and are in agreement with 3D modal simulations. The influence of parasitic high-order transverse modes is shown to be controlled by engineering the horn structure (ridge and horn widths), allowing only the fundamental mode to be coupled out.

Short pulse generation and mode control of broadband terahertz quantum cascade lasers

“…Similar irregularities in the seeded TDS spectrum of a 60 µm wide RP based metal-metal QCL with an integrated planar horn antenna were also seen in Ref. [28]. On the contrary, and as expected from the clean pulse train in Fig.…”

Physics and technology of Terahertz quantum cascade lasers

“…Only a small fraction of the terahertz power, however, can be collected, owing to the large beam divergence (~60°). High efficiency, low divergence, doublemetal devices have been practically realized by improving the laser facet outcoupling using horn antennas [26][27][28], hyperhemispherical silicon lenses [29], on-chip hollow rectangular waveguides [30] or plasmonic collimators [31], but also extracting light from the whole device area, either through 2 nd -order [32][33][34] and 3 rd -order distributed feedback gratings [35], or implementing novel resonator designs for vertical emission, employing circular geometries [36][37][38], photonic crystals [39], quasi-crystals [40,41] or even antenna-like microcavities [42]. Figure 3 displays pictures of a few THz lasers employing the above configurations.…”

Photonic Engineering Technology for the Development of Terahertz Quantum Cascade Lasers

“…[110][111][112] The overall performance is moderate and further optimization is required in this direction. The electromagnetic horn antennas are widely exploited as an impedance-matching element to boost the outcoupling efficiency and directional emission in the microwave range.…”

“…[105] Various antennas [110][111][112][113][114] were also exploited as an impedance-matching element to boost the outcoupling efficiency and to ensure the directionality of emission. Among them, an abutted high-index silicon hyper-hemispherical lens has ever been coupled to the facet of a DM ridge THz QCL.…”