An AlGaAs laser with high-quality dry etched mirrors fabricated using an ultrahigh vacuum in situ dry etching and deposition processing system

Highly reliable AlGaAs lasers with dry etched mirrors have been successfully fabricated with an ultrahigh-vacuum in situ processing system, equipped with reactive ion-beam etching (RIBE) and dielectric film deposition chambers. Etched mirror surfaces are protected against air-exposure contamination and nonvolatile-reaction-products adsorption with in situ Al/sub 2/O/sub 3/ passivation subsequent to the CI/sub 2/ RIBE mirror formation. Ion-bombardment-induced damage is repaired by thermal annealing. The annealing effect is enhanced by a contamination-free interface between the etched mirror surface and Al/sub 2/O/sub 3/ passivation film. The lasers exhibit an increase in catastrophic optical damage (COD) level and long-life operation. Their COD levels are twice as high as that for as-etched lasers and are almost the same as those for conventional cleaved lasers.>