THz coherent source based on light structuration using III-V semiconductor laser technology

THz photonics-based sources are attractive as they offer room-temperature solutions that rely on mature photonics technology and provide broadband tunability and large modulation bandwidth to address specific THz applications such as high-data-rate communications or spectroscopy. We will present an overview of our recent results on coherent and structured light emitted from III-V semiconductor lasers and we will focus on THz generation based on these original near-infrared lasers operating at 1064 nm. Vertical external-cavity surface-emitting lasers that exploit parity symmetry breaking together with integrated meta-surfaces can generate unconventional light states such as vortex light, spatially modeless laser, transverse multiplexing, non-linear structured light... Coherent THz emission has been obtained from a dual-mode laser, that operates simultaneously on two Laguerre-Gauss transverse modes, using either uni-traveling-carrier photodiodes and plasmonic photo-conductive antennas. We will discuss the ongoing work towards multiplex structured coherent photonic sources that offer high potential for powerful THz emission.