Method of manufacturing surface emitting laser, and surface emitting laser, surface emitting laser array, optical scanning device and image forming apparatus

A method of manufacturing a surface emitting laser, the surface emitting laser including:

• a laminated body in which a lower reflection mirror, a resonance structure, and an upper reflection mirror are laminated on a substrate, the resonance structure including an active layer, the upper reflection mirror including a selectively-oxidized layer, and
• a mesa structure formed in the laminated body and providing an emitting section, the emitting section including a current confined structure and an emitting region, the current confined structure including an oxide surrounding a current passage region, the emitting region including a relatively high reflection rate part and a relatively low reflection rate part, the method comprising:
• a first dielectric layer laminating step of laminating a first transparent dielectric layer on an upper surface of the laminated body;
• a first resist pattern forming step of forming a first resist pattern on an upper surface of the first transparent dielectric layer, the first resist pattern including a pattern configured to define an outer perimeter of the mesa structure and a pattern configured to protect a region corresponding to one of the relatively high reflection rate part and the relatively low reflection rate part included in the emitting region;
• a dielectric layer etching step of etching the first transparent dielectric layer by using the first resist pattern as an etching mask;
• and
• a second resist pattern forming step of forming a second resist pattern configured to protect a region corresponding to all of the emitting region, wherein
• the first dielectric layer laminating step, the first resist pattern forming step, the dielectric layer etching step, and the second resist pattern forming step are performed before the mesa structure is formed.