Brighter future for semiconductor lasers

The European 'Brighter' project is focusing on the design of a high power, high efficiency semiconductor laser backed by EU funding of €9.7million. Michel Krakowski (pictured), coordinator of the Brighter project explained; "There are many semiconductor lasers and many application fields, but certainly for lasers in the spectral range between 355 up to 1060nm, Brighter has developed state of the art technology and become one of the leaders in the field." Part of the project focused on green lasers. As no semiconductor material exists capable of emitting laser light in green, which occupies the 530nm range of the spectrum. However, there are materials capable of lasing at 1060nm. By doubling the frequency of the 1060nm laser, Brighter was able to halve its wavelength, due to the inverse relationship between the two. By this method, Brighter used frequency doubling to produce a green laser at 531nm, with output power up to more than 1.5W, which is a world record for green frequency doubled diode laser, according to the project.