Lecture Notes for Chapter 2

Optical Sources
KEE4843 Opto-Electronics
Dr. Irneza Ismail

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 Overview – Chapter 4
4.1 Topics from Semiconductor Physics
4.2 Light-Emitting Diodes (LEDs)
4.3 Laser Diodes
4.4 Light Source Linearity
4.5 Transmitter Packages

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 Energy-Level Diagrams
• The conduction properties of a semiconductor can be interpreted with
the aid of the energy-band or energy-level diagrams
• The valence band is the lowest band of allowed electron states.
• The next higher band of allowed energy levels is the conduction band.
• In a pure crystal at low temperatures, the conduction band is completely
empty of electrons and the valence band is completely full

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 Energy Level Diagrams - Donors
• The conduction can be greatly increased by adding traces of impurities
from the group V elements (e.g., P, As, Sb)
• These impurity elements are called dopants
• Donor impurities give up (donate) an electron to the conduction band

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Energy Level Diagrams - Acceptors
Acceptor impurities take (accept) an electron from the valence band

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 Pn Junction - Barrier Potential
• LEDs and laser diodes consist of a pn junction
constructed of direct-bandgap III-V materials.

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 Semiconductor Physics
• When the pn junction is forward
biased, electrons and holes are
injected into the p and n regions,
respectively.
• The injected minority carriers
recombine either radiatively (a
photon of energy hν is emitted) or The pn junction is known as
nonradiatively (the recombination the active or recombination
energy is dissipated as heat). region.

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 Forward Biasing
• Forward-biasing the pn junction lowers the barrier potential.
• This allows conduction-band electrons on the n side and valence-band
holes on the p side to diffuse across the junction.
• These crossings significantly increase the minority carrier concentrations.
• The excess carriers then recombine with the oppositely charged
majority carriers.
• The recombination of excess minority carriers is the mechanism by which
optical radiation is generated.

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 Light-Emitting Diodes (LEDs)
LED features:
• Made of GaAlAs (850 nm) or InGaAsP (S-L bands)
• Broad spectral output (50 to 150 nm)
• Optical output powers less than -13 dBm (50 μW)
• Can be modulated only up a few hundred Mb/s
• Less expensive than laser diodes
• Edge-emitter or surface emitter structures

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 LED Materials
The source emission wavelength depends on the bandgap
energy of the device material.

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 LED Examples
For In1–xGaxAsyP1–y compositions that are lattice-
matched to InP, the bandgap in eV varies as

Bandgap wavelengths from 920 to 1650 nm are

covered by this material system.

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SLED and ELED

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 Modulation of an LED
• The response time of an optical source determines how fast
an electrical input drive signal can vary the light output level
• If the drive current is modulated at a frequency ω and P0 is
the power emitted at zero modulation frequency, the optical
output power of the device will vary as

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 Laser Diode Rate Equations
• The relationship between optical output power and diode drive current
comes from the rate equations that govern the interaction of photons
and electrons in the active region
• For a pn junction with a carrier-confinement region of depth d, the rate
equations are

which governs the number of photons Φ, and

which governs the number of electrons n.

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 Fabry-Perot Lasing Cavity
A Fabry-Perot cavity consists of
two flat, partially reflecting
mirrors that establish a strong
longitudinal optical oscillator
feedback mechanism, thereby
creating a light-emitting function.

The distance between the adjacent peaks of

the resonant wavelengths in a Fabry-Perot
cavity is the free spectral range (FSR).

If D is the distance between the reflecting

mirrors in a device of refractive index n, then
at a peak wavelength λ the FSR is given by

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 Laser Optical Output vs. Drive Current
Relationship between optical output
Slope efficiency = dP/dI
and laser diode drive current. Below
The laser efficiency
the lasing threshold the optical output
changes with temperature:
is a spontaneous LED-type emission.

20° C 30° C

40° C

Optical output
50° C

Efficiency
decreases

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 Modulation of Laser Diodes
• For data rates of less than approximately 10 Gb/s (typically
2.5 Gb/s), the process of imposing information on a laser-
emitted light stream can be realized by direct modulation.
• The modulation frequency can be no larger than the
frequency of the relaxation oscillations of the laser field
• The relaxation oscillation occurs at approximately

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 Laser Linewidth
• Noise arising from spontaneous emission effects results in a
finite spectral width or linewidth Δν for the lasing output.
• In terms of the optical output Pout, the group velocity Vg, the
photon energy hν, the threshold gain gth, the cavity
loss αt, the linewidth enhancement factor α, and the
spontaneous emission factor nsp, the linewidth is

For DFB lasers the linewidth ranges from 5 to 10 MHz

(or, equivalently, around 10–4 nm).
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 External Modulation
In direct modulation, the process of turning the laser on and off with an
electrical drive current produces a widening of the laser linewidth referred
to as chirp. This can be avoided with external modulation.

The optical source injects a

constant-amplitude light signal
into an external modulator. The
electrical driving signal changes
the optical power that exits the
external modulator. This produces
a time-varying optical signal.

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 Light Source Linearity
In an analog system, a time-varying electric analog signal
modulates an optical source directly about a bias current IB.
With no signal input, the optical power output is Pt. When an
analog signal s(t) is applied, the time-varying (analog) optical
output is: P(t) = Pt[1 + m s(t)], where m = modulation index

For LEDs IB’ = IB

For laser diodes
IB’ = IB – Ith

Laser
LED
diode
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 Transmitter Packages (1)
• There are a variety of transmitter packages for different applications.
• One popular transmitter configuration is the butterfly package.
• This device has an attached fiber flylead and components such as the
diode laser, a monitoring photodiode, and a thermoelectric cooler.

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 Transmitter Packages (2)
Three standard fiber optic transceiver packages

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Figure Set 4-1

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Figure Set 4-2

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Figure Set 4-3

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