r D I (invrrea) 10:30am - 11 :OOam

Wide Temperature Range Operation of DFB Lasers at 1.3 pm Wavelength

T. R. Chen Ortel Corporation

2015 W. Chestnut St., Alhambra, CA 91803

Summary

DFB lasers operating in a wide temperature range, normally between -45 "C and +85 "C, without TE cooler provide low noise, cost-effective light sources for interactive analog distribution networks. The elimination of TE coolers may also improve the overall system reliability.

InGaAsPAnP strained multiquantum well laser structure has been proved to be a promising candidate for wide temperature range operation. DFB lasers operation in a temperature range between -60 "C and -t 1 10 "C, with a sidemode suppression ratio better than 40 dB was demonstrated.

These lasers showed very low threshold current (1.4 mA at 20°C and 7.2 mA at 8OoC), high slope eficiency (0.65 mW/mA at 20°C and 0.53 mW/mA at 80"C), low noise (RIN < -155 dB/Hz) and low distortion (CSO < -50 dBc, CTB < -65 dBc between -45 "C and +85 "C).

In this talk, advances in wide temperature DFB lasers will be reviewed. The principles for wide temperature range operation of a DFB laser will be addressed. Important issues such as maintaining singlemode operation across a wide temperature range, temperature sensitivity of threshold current and slope efficiency of a DFB laser, low distortion in a wide temperature range and reliability of wide temperature DFB lasers will be discussed.

The author would like to acknowledge the support of Rome Labs under contract #F30602-95-C-0182. I would also like to thank my colleagues Dr. P. C. Chen, Dr. J. Ungar, Dr. W. Hsin, Mr. S. Oh, Mr. H. Luong and Dr. N. Bar-Chaim, for their contribution in many ways.

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