Long-wavelength 1.3 µm GaInAsP/InP vertical cavity surface-emitting lasers (VCSELs) have been demonstrated in an array configuration. With the strong current confinement by a buried heterostructure and the efficient optical feedback by a dielectric cavity, five VCSEL elements in a 24 array operated at room temperature with 5 mW total power output and wavelength error within 5%. The stacked planar optics including the VCSEL array is a promising optical transmitter in ultra large scale parallel optical communication systems.

We have achieved the room temperature cw lasing operation of GaInAsP/InP surface emitting lasers for the first time. By employing a buried heterostructure with 1.3 µm range active region and a MgO/Si heat sink mirror, cw operation was obtained up to 14 with the threshold current of 22 mA.