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A quantum-dot laser directly grown on silicon that is scalable, low cost with an intrinsic linewidth of 16 Hz when subject to feedback from a low-quality-factor external cavity is reported.

THz integrate light sources represent an important building blocks for various applications. Here the authors report an electrically driven topological laser based on photonic Majorana zero mode that can convert electricity directly into THz single-mode laser with topologically nontrivial beams.

Topological lasers often suffer from low directionality, and/or complex design requirements hindering operation at small wavelengths. Here, by using a few monolayers of perovskite quantum dots, the authors demonstrate a lithography-free, vertical-emitting, single-mode laser emitting in the green.

Solution-processable CdS ‘bulk’ nanocrystals show efficient on-chip lasing under quasi-continuous-wave conditions with excellent beam quality and pump thresholds.

Generation and control of short pulse is desired for ultrafast applications. Here the authors demonstrate ultrafast pulse generation using self-evolving photonic crystal that can transition from high loss to low loss state based on dynamic dispersion compensation.

Stable lasers are crucial in many applications like sensing. Here, the authors demonstrate a laser frequency locking method that maintains performance, eliminates modulation, simplifies architecture, and enables miniaturization on a photonic chip.

The intrinsic Kerr nonlinearity in ring resonators is exploited to demonstrate passive isolation of a continuous-wave laser. Up to 35-dB isolation with 5-dB insertion loss was achieved on-chip.

Low threshold lasing is widely required, especially for portable systems. Here the authors design a circular subwavelength metallic aperture in a QCL to shape its phase front and control diffraction losses, which in turn allows a lower threshold dissipation power, enabling the fabrication of shorter cavities.

The breaking of parity-time symmetric gain and loss profiles can be used to achieve single-mode lasing in coupled microring resonators. Here, Liuet al. show that this effect can be electrically controlled with a tunable lasing wavelength and strong sidemode suppression.

Integrated plasmonic sources are crucial in the development of plasmonic circuitry. Here, McPolin et al. show that vertical-cavity surface-emitting lasers can be employed as an on-chip, electrically pumped source or detector of plasmonic signals and also demonstrate waveguiding and frequency conversion on this platform.

Optical metrology applications require lasers with high spectral purity but on-chip devices with sub-100 Hz linewidth are yet to be realized. Here, Liang et al.present a heterogeneously integrated, chip-scale semiconductor laser with 30 Hz integral linewidth and sub-Hz instantaneous linewidth.

Producing pulses in the mid-IR often requires bulky sources and has been inaccessible with compact and versatile quantum cascade lasers (QCLs). Here, the authors demonstrate actively mode-locked, mid-IR QCL operation at room temperature.

The authors showcase an innovative anti-reflective vertical-cavity surface-emitting laser (AR-VCSEL) that achieves low divergence and maintains a single-mode lasing. The 6-junction AR-VCSEL array demonstrates low divergence from 8° to 16° (D86) and tripled brightness compared to conventional counterparts. The AR-VCSEL offers an excellent avenue for long-distance LiDARs.

Solid-state spatio-spectral coherent light detection and ranging system is proposed based on flutter-wavelength-swept laser for real-time four-dimensional coherent imaging over extended measurable distance even in challenging environments.

Based on optically breaking time-reversal symmetry by spin polarizing a gain medium with a circularly polarized optical pump, an integrated scheme for controlling the chirality of orbital angular momentum lasing is demonstrated.

Terahertz frequency combs are highly desired for applications in precision measurements, sensing, spectroscopy and metrology. Here the authors demonstrate the room-temperature chip-based THz frequency comb using nonlinear frequency generation from a mid-infrared quantum cascade laser comb.

Proper design of the gratings can enhance the efficiency of distributed-feedback and quantum cascade lasers. Here, Jin et al. use a hybrid grating system that superposes second- and fourth-order Bragg gratings and achieve high radiative efficiency and a single-lobe radiation pattern.

Topological effects, first observed in condensed matter physics, are now also studied in optical systems, extending the scope to active topological devices. Here, Zhao et al. combine topological physics with non-Hermitian photonics, demonstrating a topological microlaser on a silicon platform.

Two-dimensional materials have recently emerged as interesting materials for optoelectronic applications. Here, Shang et al. demonstrate two-dimensional semiconductor activated vertical-cavity surface-emitting lasers where both the gain material and the lasing characteristics are two-dimensional.

Topologically protected lasing is reported in a lattice of polariton micropillars.

A silicon nanobeam cavity laser integrated with monolayer molybdenum ditelluride enables room-temperature lasing in the near infrared.

A cavity that can switch between lasing and anti-lasing could inspire a new design of optical modulator.

Orbital-angular-momentum (OAM) beams have great potential for multiplexing signals in optical communication, but creating a compact source is challenging. The authors integrate a chip-scale optical vortex emitter and DFB laser into a single monolithic device for direct electrically pumped production of OAM beams.

Fe₃O₄ nanoparticles deposited on top of GaN nanorods produce a spin-up and spin-down imbalance that makes the semiconductor emit coherent spin-polarized light.

Highly strained germanium on silicon samples with up to 3.1% uniaxial strain are fabricated and then investigated by Raman spectroscopy. During optical pumping, changes in both the emission wavelength and output power are observed, indicating that bandgap modification and optical gain are occurring.

Theoretical analysis reveals that spasers do not differ fundamentally from conventional semiconductor lasers; differences are mainly technical and result from loss in the metal. Spasers are shown to have significantly inferior threshold currents and linewidths to those of vertical-cavity surface-emitting lasers, but their speed can be slightly greater.

Researchers demonstrate a watt-class high-power, single-mode photonic-crystal laser operating continuously at room temperature. A beam quality of M² ≤ 1.1 is achieved.

Electrically injected charges can effectively contribute to optical gain in perovskite light-emitting diodes under optical and electrical co-excitation.

Colloidal quantum wells are highly promising for applications of solution-processed lasers, but their performance is limited by multi-excitonic nature of the materials. Here, the authors demonstrate optical gain in graded alloy core/shell CdSe/CdS@CdZnS quantum wells at less than one exciton per particle resulting in ultralow thresholds.

Fabricating semiconductor photonic lasers based on III-V materials are challenging because of the material mismatch with silicon. Here the authors monolithically grow quantum-dot-based photonic crystal membrane lasers directly on an on-axis silicon substrate.

We report compact spin-valley-locked perovskite emitting metasurfaces where spin-dependent geometric phases are imparted into bound states in the continuum via Brillouin zone folding, simultaneously enabling chiral purity, directionality and large emission angles.

Scientists demonstrate an optically pumped InP-based distributed feedback laser array monolithically grown on (001)-silicon operating at room temperature that is suitable for wavelength-division multiplexing applications.

The fabrication of a blue–violet semiconductor laser on a silicon substrate enhances the integration of optoelectronics with electronics.

An electrically driven organic semiconductor laser is achieved by integrating a device structure that efficiently couples an organic light-emitting diode, with extremely high internal-light generation, with a polymer distributed feedback laser.

Three-dimensional integration of distributed-feedback lasers and ultralow-loss silicon nitride waveguides results in ultralow-noise lasers without the need for optical isolators.

A superlattice structure in Eu-doped GaN is known to improve the power output of red LEDs, though the mechanism behind this needs to be further established. Here, terahertz emission spectroscopy is used to understand the role played by potential barriers and carrier confinement in determining power output.

Researchers demonstrate a topological-cavity surface-emitting laser with a 10 W peak power and sub-degree beam divergence at 1,550 nm wavelength. The system is also capable of multiple-wavelength arrays.

We developed large-scale photonic-crystal surface-emitting lasers with controlled Hermitian and non-Hermitian couplings inside the photonic crystal and a pre-installed spatial distribution of the lattice constant, which leads to the realization of a continuous-wave brightness of 1 GW cm⁻² sr⁻¹.

Solution-processed infrared lasers that operate at room temperature are a challenge, but now researchers have achieved such a device using colloidal quantum dots.

Here the authors harness the on-chip integration of Jones matrix metasurfaces to demonstrate an ultra-compact approach to access and manipulate the optical spin states of vertical cavity surface-emitting lasers (VCSELs) with previously unattainable phase controllability.

It is possible to regulate random lasers by controlling and manipulating their properties, including the number and spatial positions of their lasing modes, and the lasing wavelength and the modal size over wide ranges. Performances comparable with non-random optical cavities with 2D photonic crystals are reported.

Terahertz quantum-cascade lasers with over 20% continuous fractional tuning of a single laser mode are now possible thanks to metasurfaces.