Abstract

The nonlinear gain is known to have an important influence on the dynamics and noise properties of semiconductor lasers [1, 2]. The previous studies have used a form of the nonlinear gain derived from the consideration of the material properties alone such as spectral hole burning or carrier heating [3,4]. In every model, the nonlinear gain is a function of the local photon density. However, in most semiconductor lasers, the photon density is not uniform along the cavity due to the output coupling. A natural question is what is the effective nonlinear gain that should appear in the rate equations governing the laser dynamics and noise properties. The purpose of this paper is to clarify the influence of photon density distribution on the nonlinear gain.

© 1992 Optical Society of America