Abstract

We demonstrate a chaotic microcavity laser whose quality is comparable to typical nonchaotic microcavity lasers, yet it has the unique characteristic of unidirectional output. The cavity shape is a disk with the boundary defined by a curve called limaccedilon of Pascal. For a lasing mode of volume less than 0.2 mu m(3), the measured quality factor is 23 000. The record-high quality and small modal volume result in extremely low-lasing threshold. The spontaneous emission coupling efficiency is approximately 6% and is the reported value for a chaotic microcavity laser. All the lasing modes have one output beam in the same direction with a divergence angle less than 40 degrees. This universal directionality is determined by the chaotic ray dynamics in the open cavity.

Publication Details
Publication Type
Journal Article
Year of Publication
2009
Volume
80
DOI
10.1103/PhysRevA.80.041807
Journal
Physical Review A
Contributors
Groups