High-speed resonant cavity light-emitting diodes at 650 nm

State-of-the-art resonant cavity light-emitting diodes (RC-LEDs) optimized for short-haul communication systems on polymethyl methacrylate (PMMA) plastic optical fiber (POF) are presented. The devices, emitting in the 650-nm wavelength range, are achieving, under different structure and working regime variants, high output power (15 mW), high external quantum efficiency (9.5%), record small-signal modulation bandwidth (f/sub -3/ /sub dB/ UP to 350 MHz), error free back-to-back transmission rates beyond 622 Mb/s, adjustable far-field pattern and good coupling efficiency into step index plastic optical fibers with reasonably large tolerances and without using auxiliary optics. The paper discusses the design concepts, modeling approaches, fabrication issues and performance characteristics of monolithic RC-LEDs emitting at 650 nm.