The United States of America As Represented by the United States

Sandia Corporation

John P Hohimer

G Ronald Hadley

Adelbert Owyoung

Carol I Ashby

G Allen Vawter

David C Craft

Daniel Ralph Neal

Vincent Mark Hietala

Alan Mar

John C Zolper

William F Filter

An attachment structure is disclosed for attaching a die to a supporting substrate without the use of adhesives or solder. The attachment structure, which can be formed by micromachining, functions purely mechanically in utilizing a plurality of shaped pillars (e.g. round, square or polygonal and solid, hollow or slotted) that are formed on one of the die or supporting substrate and which can be urged into contact with various types of mating structures including other pillars, a deformable layer or a plurality of receptacles that are formed on the other of the die or supporting substrate, thereby forming a friction bond that holds the die to the supporting substrate. The attachment structure can further include an alignment structure for precise positioning of the die and supporting substrate to facilitate mounting the die to the supporting substrate. The attachment structure has applications for mounting semiconductor die containing a microelectromechanical (MEM) device, a microsensor or an integrated circuit (IC), and can be used to form a multichip module. The attachment structure is particularly useful for mounting die containing released MEM devices since these devices are fragile and can otherwise be damaged or degraded by adhesive or solder mounting.

Micromechanical die attachment surcharge

An opto-electronic integrated circuit (OEIC) apparatus is disclosed for generating an electrical signal at a frequency .gtoreq.10 GHz. The apparatus, formed on a single substrate, includes a semiconductor ring laser for generating a continuous train of mode-locked lasing pulses and a high-speed photodetector for detecting the train of lasing pulses and generating the electrical signal therefrom. Embodiments of the invention are disclosed with an active waveguide amplifier coupling the semiconductor ring laser and the high-speed photodetector. The invention has applications for use in OEICs and millimeter-wave monolithic integrated circuits (MMICs).

Apparatus for millimeter-wave signal generation

A monolithically integrated photonic circuit combining a semiconductor source of excitation light with an optically active waveguide formed on the substrate. The optically active waveguide is preferably formed of a spin-on glass to which are added optically active materials which can enable lasing action, optical amplification, optical loss, or frequency conversion in the waveguide, depending upon the added material.

Monolithically integrated solid state laser and waveguide using spin-on

Two ring diode lasers are optically coupled together to produce tunable, stable output through a Y-junction output coupler which may also be a laser diode or can be an active waveguide. These devices demonstrate a sharp peak in light output with an excellent side-mode-rejection ratio. The rings can also be made of passive or active waveguide material. With additional rings the device is a tunable optical multiplexer/demultiplexer.

Interferometric ring lasers and optical devices

Unidirectional ring lasers formed by integrating nonreciprocal optical elements into the resonant ring cavity. These optical elements either attenuate light traveling in a nonpreferred direction or amplify light traveling in a preferred direction. In one preferred embodiment the resonant cavity takes the form of a circle with an S-shaped crossover waveguide connected to two points on the interior of the cavity such that light traveling in a nonpreferred direction is diverted from the cavity into the crossover waveguide and reinjected out of the other end of the crossover waveguide into the cavity as light traveling in the preferred direction.

Unidirectional ring lasers

A high-power broad-area semiconductor laser having a intracavity spatial phase controller is disclosed. The integrated intracavity spatial phase controller is easily formed by patterning an electrical contact metallization layer when fabricating the semiconductor laser. This spatial phase controller changes the normally broad far-field emission beam of such a laser into a single-lobed near-diffraction-limited beam at pulsed output powers of over 400 mW. Two operating modes, a thermal and a gain operating mode, exist for the phase controller, allowing for steering and switching the beam as the modes of operation are switched, and the emission beam may be scanned, for example, over a range of 1.4 degrees or switched by 8 degrees. More than one spatial phase controller may be integrated into the laser structure.

Semiconductor diode laser having an intracavity spatial phase controller

A continuous wave integrated injection-locked high-power diode laser array is provided with an on-chip independently-controlled master laser. The integrated injection locked high-power diode laser array is capable of continuous wave lasing in a single near-diffraction limited output beam at single-facet power levels up to 125 mW (250 mW total). Electronic steering of the array emission over an angle of 0.5 degrees is obtained by varying current to the master laser. The master laser injects a laser beam into the slave array by reflection of a rear facet.

Integrated injection-locked semiconductor diode laser

A broad-area semiconductor laser diode includes an active lasing region interposed between an upper and a lower cladding layer, the laser diode further comprising structure for controllably varying a lateral refractive index profile of the diode to substantially compensate for an effect of junction heating during operation. In embodiments disclosed the controlling structure comprises resistive heating strips or non-radiative linear junctions disposed parallel to the active region. Another embodiment discloses a multi-layered upper cladding region selectively disordered by implanted or diffused dopant impurities. Still another embodiment discloses an upper cladding layer of variable thickness that is convex in shape and symmetrically disposed about a central axis of the active region. The teaching of the invention is also shown to be applicable to arrays of semiconductor laser diodes.

Semiconductor laser devices having lateral refractive index tailoring

By optically injecting a single end-element of a semiconductor laser array, both the spatial and spectral emission characteristics of the entire laser array is controlled. With the output of the array locked, the far-field emission angle of the array is continuously scanned over several degrees by varying the injection frequency.

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Albuquerque, NM, United States of America

John P Hohimer