Effects of Anisotropies on Vectorial Modes of Vertical-Cavity Surface-Emitting Lasers

The consequences of material anisotropies in vertical-cavity surface-emitting lasers (VCSELs) are analyzed in detail. To this aim we apply the full vectorial model recently published in Bava et al. [Phys. Rev. A 63, 023816 (2001)] which is based on the mode expansion of the vectorial electromagnetic field in the continuous basis of cylindrical TE and TM modes of a reference medium and on coupled mode theory. The self-consistency between backward and forward waves leads to an eigenvalue problem: the complex eigenvalues determine both the required gain and the lasing frequency of the cavity modes, while the eigenvectors allow the reconstruction of the fields. The capability of the fully vectorial treatment to experience the tensorial nature of the dielectrical permittivity is exploited to analyze in detail the consequences of the elasto-optic effect in VCSELs with reference to modal frequencies, gains and profiles.