Vertical-cavity surface-emitting semiconductor laser arrays

A vertical-cavity surface-emitting semiconductor laser array device comprising:

• a semiconductor substrate and a multilayer structure on the substrate including a layer with an active region at which light emission occurs, upper and lower layers surrounding the active region layer, upper and lower faces, electrodes by which voltage can be applied across the multilayer structure and the substrate, at least four core elements arranged in a two-dimensional array, the core elements separated from one another and surrounded by a matrix region formed to have an effective higher index than the core elements for antiguiding of the radiation leakage from the core elements and including material providing loss for the radiation in the interelement regions, the width of the matrix region separating adjacent core elements selected to provide in-phase resonant coupling of the antiguided radiation leakage between the core elements, an upper reflector above the active region layer and a lower reflector below the active region layer, the matrix region and the upper and lower reflectors positioned to act upon the light generated in the active region to produce lasing action phase-locked between the core elements to produce emission of light from at least one of the upper and lower faces of the semiconductor laser array, and means for confining the current from the electrodes to the area of the array of core elements.