Evidence for "dark charge" from photoluminescence measurements in wide InGaN quantum wells.

Wide (15-25 nm) InGaN/GaN quantum wells in LED structures were studied by time-resolved photoluminescence (PL) spectroscopy and compared with narrow (2.6 nm) wells in similar LED structures. Using below-barrier pulsed excitation in the microsecond range, we measured increase and decay of PL pulses. These pulses in wide wells at low-intensity excitation show very slow increase and fast decay. Moreover, the shape of the pulses changes when we vary the separation between them. None of these effects occurs for samples with narrow wells. The unusual properties of wide wells are attributed to the presence of "dark charge" i.e., electrons and holes in the ground states. Their wave functions are spatially separated and due to negligible overlap they do not contribute to emission. However, they screen the built-in field in the well very effectively so that excited states appear with significant overlap and give rise to PL. A simple model of recombination kinetics including "dark charge" explains the observations qualitatively.

Note: Coupling of multiple laser diodes into a multi-mode fiber.

Diode lasers are coupled to a multi-mode fiber (with 100-400 µm core) using a reflector in the form of a regular pyramid. The optimization of the optical setup allows to couple 60%-90% of light into the fiber. The demonstrator achieves 3.5 W in the 100/125 µm fiber with 8 violet (405 nm) diodes, 5.5 W in the 100/125 µm fiber with 8 blue (445 nm) diodes, and 3.3 W in the 200/250 µm fiber with red (638 nm) diodes. The device can work with lasers emitting at many different wavelengths, including green (532 nm) frequency-doubled lasers. Our work was motivated by potential medical applications of these laser sources.