Abstract

The resonant cavity light emitting diode (RCLED)¹ consists of a light-emitting active region placed inside a resonant optical cavity and shares a very similar structure to the vertical cavity surface-emitting laser (VCSEL). Both devices are potential light sources in applications such as wavelength division multiplexing, optical fiber communications, and free-space optical interconnects. Broad and continuous wavelength tunability is an attractive feature in many of these applications; however, because the resonant wavelength is determined by refractive indices and fixed vertical layer thicknesses, attempts to time the resonance through refractive index modulation are limited to a few nanometers in the near IR.² Recently we demonstrated a tunable optical cavity based on the micromechanical motion of a suspended deformable-membrane top mirror.³ Here we describe the optically-excited luminescence of quantum wells (QWs) placed within such a tunable resonant cavity to achieve broadly- and continuously-tunable light emission.

© 1995 IEEE