Semiconductor Sources for

Optical Communications
 Considerations with Optical
Sources
 Physical dimensions to suit the fiber

 Narrow radiation pattern (beam width)

 Linearity (output light power proportional to

driving current)
 Considerations with Optical
Sources

 Ability to be directly modulated by varying

driving current

 Fast response time (wide band)

 Adequate output power into the fiber

 Considerations…

 Narrow spectral width (or line width)

 Stability and efficiency

 Driving circuit issues

 Reliability and cost

 Semiconductor Light Sources
 A PN junction (that consists of direct band gap
semiconductor materials) acts as the active or
recombination region.
 When the PN junction is forward biased, electrons
and holes recombine either radiatively (emitting
photons) or non-radiatively (emitting heat). This is
simple LED operation.
 In a LASER, the photon is further processed in a
resonance cavity to achieve a coherent, highly
directional optical beam with narrow linewidth.
 LED vs. laser spectral width

Single-frequency laser
(<0.04 nm) Laser output is many times
higher than LED output; they
would not show on same scale
Standard laser
(1-3 nm wide)

LED (30-50 nm wide)

Wavelength
 Light Emission

 Basic LED operation: When an electron

jumps from a higher energy state (Ec) to a
lower energy state (Ev) the difference in
energy Ec- Ev is released either
 as a photon of energy E = h (radiative
recombination)
 as heat (non-radiative recombination)
 Energy-Bands

In a pure Gp. IV material, equal number of holes and electrons

exist at different energy levels.
 n-type material

Adding group V impurity will create an n- type material

 p-type material

Adding group III impurity will create a p-type material

 The Light Emitting Diode (LED)

 For fiber-optics, the LED should have a

high radiance (light intensity), fast response
time and a high quantum efficiency
 Double or single hetero-structure devices
 Surface emitting (diffused radiation) Vs
Edge emitting (more directional) LED’s
 Emitted wavelength depends on bandgap
energy
E g  h  hc / 
 Heterojunction

 Heterojunction is the advanced junction

design to reduce diffraction loss in the
optical cavity.
 This is accomplished by modification of the
laser material to control the index of
refraction of the cavity and the width of the
junction.
 The p-n junction of the basic GaAs LED/laser
described before is called a homojunction
because only one type of semiconductor
material is used in the junction with different
dopants to produce the junction itself.
 The index of refraction of the material
depends upon the impurity used and the
doping level.
 The Heterojunction region is actually lightly
doped with p-type material and has the highest
index of refraction.
 The n-type material and the more heavily doped p-
type material both have lower indices of refraction.
 This produces a light pipe effect that helps to
confine the laser light to the active junction region.
In the homojunction, however, this index difference
is low and much light is lost.
 Gallium Arsenide-Aluminum Gallium
Arsenide Heterojunction
 Structure and index of refraction n for various types of junctions in
gallium arsenide with a junction width d.
 (a) is for a homojunction.
 (b) is for a gallium arsenide-aluminum gallium arsenide single
heterojunction.
 (c) is for a gallium arsenide-aluminum gallium arsenide double
heterojunction with improved optical confinement.
 (d) is for a double heterojunction with a large optical cavity of width w.
 Double-
heterostructure
configuration
Structure of a Generic Light Emitter:
Double-Heterostructure Device
 OPERATING WAVELENGTH

Fiber optic communication systems operate in the

 850-nm,
 1300-nm, and
 1550-nm wavelength windows.
 Semiconductor sources are designed to operate
at wavelengths that minimize optical fiber
absorption and maximize system bandwidth
LED Wavelength
1.2399
 ( m) 
E (eV)

= hc/E(eV)

= wavelength in microns

H = Planks constant
C = speed of light
E = Photon energy in eV
Bandgap Energy and Possible Wavelength
Ranges in Various Materials
 SEMICONDUCTOR LIGHT-
EMITTING DIODES
 Semiconductor LEDs emit incoherent
light.
 Spontaneous emission of light in
semiconductor LEDs produces light
waves that lack a fixed-phase relationship.
Light waves that lack a fixed-phase
relationship are referred to as incoherent
light
SEMICONDUCTOR LIGHT-EMITTING DIODES
Cont…

 The use of LEDs in single mode systems is

severely limited because they emit unfocused
incoherent light.
 Even LEDs developed for single mode systems
are unable to launch sufficient optical power
into single mode fibers for many applications.
 LEDs are the preferred optical source for
multimode systems because they can launch
sufficient power at a lower cost than
semiconductor LDs.
 Semiconductor LDs

 Semiconductor LDs emit coherent light.

 LDs produce light waves with a fixed-
phase relationship (both spatial and
temporal) between points on the
electromagnetic wave.
 Light waves having a fixed-phase
relationship are referred to as coherent
light.
 Semiconductor LDs Cont..

 Semiconductor LDs emit more focused

light than LEDs, they are able to launch
optical power into both single mode
and multimode optical fibers.
 LDs are usually used only in single
mode fiber systems because they
require more complex driver circuitry
and cost more than LEDs.
 Produced Optical Power

 Optical power produced by optical

sources can range from microwatts
(W) for LEDs to tens of milliwatts
(mW) for semiconductor LDs.
 However, it is not possible to
effectively couple all the available
optical power into the optical fiber
for transmission.
 Dependence of coupled power

The amount of optical power coupled into the

fiber is the relevant optical power. It depends on
the following factors:
 The angles over which the light is emitted
 The size of the source's light-emitting area
relative to the fiber core size
 The alignment of the source and fiber
 The coupling characteristics of the fiber (such
as the NA and the refractive index profile)
 Typically, semiconductor lasers emit light spread out over an
angle of 10 to 15 degrees.
 Semiconductor LEDs emit light spread out at even larger
angles.
 Coupling losses of several decibels can easily occur when
coupling light from an optical source to a fiber, especially with
LEDs.
 Source-to-fiber coupling efficiency is a measure of the
relevant optical power.
 The coupling efficiency depends on the type of fiber that is
attached to the optical source.
 Coupling efficiency also depends on the coupling technique.
 Current flowing through a semiconductor
optical source causes it to produce light.
 LEDs generally produce light through
spontaneous emission when a current is
passed through them.
 Spontaneous Emission

 Spontaneous emission is the random

generation of photons within the active layer
of the LED. The emitted photons move in
random directions. Only a certain
percentage of the photons exit the
semiconductor and are coupled into the
fiber. Many of the photons are absorbed by
the LED materials and the energy dissipated
as heat.
 LIGHT-EMITTING DIODES

 A light-emitting diode (LED) is a

semiconductor device that emits
incoherent light, through spontaneous
emission, when a current is passed
through it. Typically LEDs for the 850-
nm region are fabricated using GaAs
and AlGaAs. LEDs for the 1300-nm and
1550-nm regions are fabricated using
InGaAsP and InP.
 Types of LED

The basic LED types used for

fiber optic communication
systems are
 Surface-emitting LED (SLED),
 Edge-emitting LED (ELED), and
 LED performance differences (1)

 LED performance differences help link designers

decide which device is appropriate for the intended
application.
 For short-distance (0 to 3 km), low-data-rate fiber
optic systems, SLEDs and ELEDs are the preferred
optical source.
 Typically, SLEDs operate efficiently for bit rates up to
250 megabits per second (Mb/s). Because SLEDs
emit light over a wide area (wide far-field angle), they
are almost exclusively used in multimode systems.
 LED performance differences (2)

 For medium-distance, medium-data-rate systems,

ELEDs are preferred.
 ELEDs may be modulated at rates up to 400 Mb/s.
ELEDs may be used for both single mode and
multimode fiber systems.
 Both SLDs and ELEDs are used in long-distance,
high-data-rate systems. SLDs are ELED-based
diodes designed to operate in the
superluminescence mode.
 SLDs may be modulated at bit rates of over 400
Mb/s.
 Surface-Emitting LEDs
 The surface-emitting LED is also known as the Burrus
LED in honor of C. A. Burrus, its developer.
 In SLEDs, the size of the primary active region is limited
to a small circular area of 20 m to 50 m in diameter.
 The active region is the portion of the LED where photons
are emitted. The primary active region is below the
surface of the semiconductor substrate perpendicular to
the axis of the fiber.
 A well is etched into the substrate to allow direct
coupling of the emitted light to the optical fiber. The
etched well allows the optical fiber to come into close
contact with the emitting surface.
Surface-emitting LED
Edge-emitting LED
 LED Spectral Width

Edge emitting LED’s have slightly narrow line width

 Quantum Efficiency
 Internal quantum efficiency is the ratio
between the radiative recombination rate and
the sum of radiative and nonradiative
recombination rates
int  Rr /( Rr  Rnr )
 For exponential decay of excess carriers,
the radiative recombination lifetime is n/Rr
and the nonradiative recombination lifetime
is n/Rnr
 Internal Efficiency

If the current injected into the LED is I, then the

total number of recombination per second is,
Rr+Rnr = I/q where, q is the charge of an
electron.
That is, Rr = intI/q.
Since Rr is the total number of photons
generated per second, the optical power
generated internal to the LED depends on the
internal quantum efficiency
 External Efficiency
n2
n1
Light
emission
cone

External Efficiency for air

Fresnel Transmission Coefficient n2=1, n1 = n

T (0)  4n1n 2 2 ext  1

 n1  n2  n(n  1) 2
 3-dB bandwidths
P( f )  Po / 1  (2f ) 2

Optical Power  I(f); Electrical Power  I2(f)

Electrical Loss = 2 x Optical Loss

 Drawbacks of LED
 Large line width (30-40 nm)
 Large beam width (Low coupling to the
fiber)
 Low output power
 Low E/O conversion efficiency
Advantages
 Robust
 Linear
 The LASER

 Light Amplification by ‘Stimulated Emission’

and Radiation (L A S E R)
 Coherent light (stimulated emission)
 Narrow beam width (very focused beam)
 High output power (amplification)
 Narrow line width because only few
wavelength will experience a positive
feedback and get amplified (optical filtering)
 Fundamental Lasing Operation

 Absorption: An atom in the ground state might

absorb a photon emitted by another atom, thus
making a transition to an excited state.
 Spontaneous Emission: Random emission of a
photon, which enables the atom to relax to the
ground state.
 Stimulated Emission: An atom in an excited state
might be stimulated to emit a photon by another
incident photon.
 In Stimulated Emission incident
and stimulated photons will have

 Identical energy  Identical wavelength

 Narrow linewidth
 Identical direction  Narrow beam width
 Identical phase  Coherence and
 Identical polarization
 Laser Transition Processes
(Stimulated and Spontaneous
Emission)

Energy Random Coherent

absorbed from release of release of
the incoming energy energy
photon
Stimulated Emission
Fabry-Perot Laser
(resonator) cavity
Mirror Reflections
How a Laser Works