Gain-Power Trade-Off in Low-Confinement Semiconductor Optical Amplifiers

We report simulation and experimental results to explore the fundamental trade-off between small-signal gain (G
₀
) and saturation output power (P
_0,SAT
) in semiconductor optical amplifiers having very small (< 1%) optical confinement factor Γ. We demonstrate a high-power 1.5-μm InGaAsP slab-coupled optical waveguide amplifier (SCOWA) exhibiting G
₀
= 22.5 dB and P
_0,SAT
= +28.8dBm.