High intensity single-mode VCSELs

A vertical cavity surface emitting laser (VCSEL) for radiating a high-intensity single-mode light beam along an optical axis, the VCSEL comprising:

• an optical cavity having an optical loss, the optical cavity including:
• a first mirror region and a second mirror region, the first mirror region and the second mirror region being conductive, and having opposite conductivity modes,
• a plane light-generating region sandwiched between the first mirror region and the second mirror region, perpendicular to the optical axis, and
• means for defining a lateral extent of the optical cavity in the plane of the light-generating region;
• and
• a single contoured loss control layer on a surface of the first mirror region, remote from the active region, the contoured loss control layer including a curved surface remote from the first mirror region and substantially centered on the optical axis.

A vertical cavity surface emitting laser (VCSEL) for radiating a high-intensity single-mode light beam along an optical axis, the VCSEL comprising:

• an optical cavity having an optical loss, the optical cavity including:
• a first mirror region and a second mirror region, the first mirror region and the second mirror region being conductive and having opposite conductivity modes, the first mirror region comprising a serial arrangement of:
• a multi-layer conductive mirror;
• and
• a multi-layer dielectric mirror,
• a plane light-generating region sandwiched between the conductive mirror and the second mirror region, perpendicular to the optical axis, and
• means for defining a lateral extent of the optical cavity in the plane of the light-generating region;
• and
• a contoured loss control layer of anti-reflective material sandwiched between the conductive mirror and the dielectric mirror, the contoured loss control layer having a thickness that progressively changes by about .+-..lambda./4n.sub.4 between the optical axis and a lateral distance corresponding to the lateral extent of the optical cavity, where .lambda. is the wavelength of the light generated in the light-generating region and n.sub.4 is the refractive index of the contoured loss control layer.