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A method of studying the absorption coefficient in layers of semiconductor lasers is proposed. Using lasers based on MOVPE-grown separate-confinement heterostructures with a broadened waveguide, the absorption coefficient is investigated under pulsed current pumping. It is found that when the pump current flows through the laser in question, an additional internal optical absorption arises in the heterostructure layers. It is shown that an increase in the pump current density up to leads to an increase in absorption up to . The feasibility of studying free-carrier absorption in the active region is demonstrated.

We report an experimental study of power characteristics of semiconductor lasers based on MOVPE-grown asymmetric separate-confinement heterostructures with a broadened waveguide as functions of cavity length, stripe contact width and mirror reflectivities. It is shown that at high current pump levels, the variation of the cavity parameters of a semiconductor laser (width, length and mirror reflectivities) influences the light – current characteristic saturation and maximum optical power by affecting such laser characteristics, as the current density and the optical output loss. A model is elaborated and an optical power of semiconductor lasers is calculated by taking into account the dependence of the internal optical loss on pump current density and concentration distribution of charge carriers and photons along the cavity axis of the cavity. It is found that only introduction of the dependence of the internal optical loss on pump current density to the calculation model provides a good agreement between experimental and calculated characteristics for all scenarios of variations in the laser cavity parameters.

Semiconductor lasers based on MOVPE-grown asymmetric separate-confinement heterostructures with a broadened waveguide and emitting in the wavelength range are studied. It is found that the intensity of spontaneous emission from the active region increases with increasing pump current above the lasing threshold and that this is caused by a growth in the concentration of charge carriers in the active region due to the modal gain enhancement needed to compensate for the growing internal optical loss at high pulsed pump currents. It is shown that the increase in the internal optical loss with increasing pulsed pump current is one of the main reasons for saturation of the light – current characteristics of high-power semiconductor lasers.