Room-temperature photopumped InGaN/GaN/AlGaN vertical-cavity surface-emitting laser

Abstract

We report photopumped room-temperature surface-mode lasing at 401 nm in a InGaAlN vertical-cavity surface-emitting laser grown on a sapphire substrate using metal–organic vapor-phase epitaxy. A 2λ cavity was formed by a quarter-wave ${\mathrm{Al}}_{\mathrm{0.15}}{\mathrm{Ga}}_{\mathrm{0.85}}\mathrm{N/GaN}$ distributed Bragg reflector on the one side of the active layer and a GaN–air interface on the other. A multilayer structure composed of 12-fold-stacked ultrathin InGaN insertions in a GaN matrix served as an active layer providing ultrahigh material gain and making possible vertical lasing without use of the upper Bragg reflector.