On-Chip Transferrable Microdisk Lasers

Si photonics has been receiving substantial attention as an integration platform in photonics and optoelectronic research, owing to the ability to manufacture low-cost, compact integrated circuits. However, realizing efficient and high-quality light sources remains a major challenge. Herein, we report an on-chip transferrable low-threshold single microdisk laser, which is fabricated by the microtransfer printing using a structured polymer. The optically transparent and adhesive microtip enables readily reproducible, damage-free, and precisely aligned mm targeted transfer of a single microdisk in the growth substrate onto a prefabricated Si-post on a silicon-on-insulator wafer. Spectroscopic measurements revealed that the microdisk laser with a small Si-post exhibits rich lasing actions with an estimated threshold of similar to 96.8 mu W. A controlled experiment revealed that laser devices with varied Si-post sizes exhibit no significant changes in optical properties until the size of the Si-post becomes comparable with that of the microdisk. These observations agreed with the results of systematic three-dimensional numerical simulations. We believe that our microtransfer printing technique can be used to transfer micro- and nanostructures onto targeted locations and realize complex microscale heterogeneous architectures in a compact integrated circuit.