1.3 μm electroabsorption reflection modulators on GaAs

We demonstrate a reflection electroabsorption modulator grown on a GaAs substrate operating near 1.3 μm, the dispersion minimum for silica fibers. The device was grown by molecular beam epitaxy and uses a novel technique of integrating the bottom quarter-wave mirror into a buffer with linearly graded In composition. The active area consisted of thirty InGaAs quantum wells with GaAs barriers. The mirror was formed by layers of InGaAs and InAlAs where the In concentration was graded from 0% to 35%. A maximum relative change in reflectivity, ΔR/R, of 73% at 1.33 μm was achieved. Experimental results agree with simulations performed using the transfer matrix technique.