High-power VCSEL arrays for emission in the watt regime at room temperature

Selectively oxidized InGaAs vertical-cavity surface emitting lasers (VCSELs) at an emission wavelength of /spl lambda/=980 mm are investigated for high-power applications. Densely packed arrays consisting of 19 single devices with an active diameter of 50 μm emit 1.08 W of continuous-wave (CW) optical output power at room temperature. At 10/spl deg/C, heat sink temperature the output power increases to 1.4 W, which corresponds to a chip size averaged power density of 1 kW/spl middot/cm2. Low divergence angle of less than 16/spl deg/ full-width at half-maximum (FWHM) and the circularly symmetric far-field pattern allow for simple focusing of the beam with power densities above 10 kW/spl middot/cm2.