Continuous room-temperature photopumped laser operation of visible-spectrum LPE In1-xGaxP1-zAsz(λ ~ 6700 Å)

A modified version of the standard step cooled LPE growth process is described for the growth of visible-spectrum In
1-x
Ga
x
P
1-z
As
z
double-heterostructure (DH) lasers on GaAs
1-y
P
y
(
y \sim 0.30
). The quality of the quaternary epitaxial layers is improved by growing a "thick" uniform active region (∼1000 Å) by means of a multiple-layer stack of "thin" (∼100 Å) layers. Each of the "thin" layers grown (cyclically) from an equilibrium melt in the short growth period of <100 ms does not make a transition to the diffusion-limited conditions employed in standard LPE growth processes. This method of liquid-phase epitaxy has been used to grow In
1-x
Ga
x
P
1-z
As
z
-In
1-x'
Ga
x'
- P
1-z'
As
z'
(
x \sim 0.87, z \sim 0.44; x' \sim 0.66, z' \lsim 0.01
) DH's that operate as photopumped CW 300 K lasers at
\lambda \sim 6700
Å.