Swiss researchers from the Federal Polytechnic School of Lausanne (EPFL) have created the world's first chip-integrated laser, which by its characteristics is not inferior to traditional fiber devices. A scientific breakthrough paves the way for the development of smaller, more portable and economical lasers for various fields of application.
The laser beam generated by this device has a narrow width, which allows it to create constant light. It is necessary for various applications, from LiDAR (technology for obtaining and information about distant objects using active optical systems that use the phenomena of light reflection and its scattering in transparent and translucent media  ;— ed.) to sounding, manufacture of gyroscopes and metrology using optical frequency. During the tests, the researchers confirmed that the laser beam generates an output power of 10mW and has a lateral suppression factor of more than 70dB, which is far superior to traditional laser systems.
Microlaser also showed better results than fiber lasers in the tunability of the laser wavelength in the range of 40 nm in the C- and L-bands. These wavelengths are important for telecommunications applications, and lasers on photonic chips will help create more advanced systems. The features of this device became possible thanks to the internal cavity design, in which the researchers used vernier filters on the basis of microrings. Yang Liu, one of the co-authors of the study, noted: “We designed a laser meter-long resonator, despite the compact size of the chip, thanks to the integration of microring resonators, which effectively expand the optical path without physically increasing the devices.