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Nanolasers based on emerging dielectric cavities with deep sub‐wavelength confinement of light offer a large light‐matter coupling rate and near‐unity spontaneous emission factor, β$\beta$. These features call for reconsidering the standard approach to identifying the lasing threshold. Here, a new threshold definition is suggested, taking into account the recycling process of photons when β$\beta$ is large. This threshold reduces to the classical balance between gain and loss in the limit of macroscopic lasers, but qualitative as well as quantitative differences emerge for nanolasers. In particular, this new threshold identifies the onset of a transition regime, where the quantum statistics of the emitted light evolve into the Poissonian statistics of a coherent state. It is shown that the threshold with photon recycling consistently marks the onset of the change in the second‐order intensity correlation, g(2)(0)$g^{(2)}(0)$, toward coherent laser light, irrespective of the laser size and down to the case of a single emitter. In contrast, other threshold definitions may well predict lasing in light‐emitting diodes. An overview of different threshold definitions proposed in the literature is provided and their predictions are compared when going from macroscopic to microscopic lasers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Self‐assembled semiconductor quantum dots face challenges in terms of scalable device integration because of their random growth positions, originating from the Stranski–Krastanov growth mode. Even with existing site‐controlled growth techniques, for example, nanohole or buried stressor concepts, a further lithography and etching step with high spatial alignment requirements is necessary to accurately integrate quantum dots into the nanophotonic devices. Here, the fabrication and characterization of strain‐induced site‐controlled microcavities are reported, where site‐controlled quantum dots are positioned at the antinode of the optical mode field in a self‐aligned manner without the need of any further nano‐processing. It is shown that the cavity properties such as Q‐factor, mode volume, and mode splitting can be tailored by the geometry of the integrated buried stressor, with an opening <4 µm. The experimental results are complemented with theory calculations based on continuum elasticity. Lasing signatures, including super‐linear input‐output response and linewidth narrowing, are observed for a 3.6‐µm self‐aligned cavity with a Q‐factor of 18 000. Furthermore, the quasi‐planar site‐controlled cavities exhibit no detrimental thermal effects. This approach integrates seamlessly with the industrial‐matured manufacturing process and the buried‐stressor technique, paving the way for exceptional scalability and straightforward manufacturing of high‐β microlasers and bright quantum light sources. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The current need for coherent light sources for integrated (nano)photonics motivates the search for novel laser designs emitting at technologically relevant wavelengths with high‐frequency stability and low power consumption. Here, a new monolithic architecture that integrates monolayer MoS2 and chains of silver nanoparticles on a rare‐earth (Nd3+) doped LiNbO3 platform is developed to demonstrate Q‐switched lasing operation at the nanoscale. The localized surface plasmons provided by the nanoparticle chains spatially confine the gain generated by Nd3+ ions at subwavelength scales, and large‐area monolayer MoS2 acts as saturable absorber. As a result, an ultra‐compact coherent pulsed light source delivering stable train pulses with repetition rates of hundreds of kHz and pulse duration of 1 µs is demonstrated without the need of any voltage‐driven optical modulation. Moreover, the monolithic integration of the different elements is achieved without sophisticated processing, and it is compatible with LiNbO3‐based photonics. The results highlight the robustness of the approach, which can be extended to other 2D materials and solid‐state gain media. Potential applications in communications, quantum computing, or ultra‐sensitive sensing can benefit from the synergy of the materials involved in this approach, which provides a wealth of opportunities for light control at reduced scales. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Photonics inverse design relies on human experts to search for a design topology that satisfies certain optical specifications with their experience and intuitions, which is relatively labor-intensive, slow, and sub-optimal. Machine learning has emerged as a powerful tool to automate this inverse design process. However, supervised or semi-supervised deep learning is unsuitable for this task due to: (1) a severe shortage of available training data due to the high computational complexity of physics-based simulations along with a lack of open-source datasets and/or the need for a pre-trained neural network model; (2) the issue of one-to-many mapping or non-unique solutions; and (3) the inability to perform optimization of the photonic structure beyond inverse designing. Reinforcement Learning (RL) has the potential to overcome the above three challenges. Here, we propose Learning to Design Optical-Resonators (L2DO) to leverage RL that learns to autonomously inverse design nanophotonic laser cavities without any prior knowledge while retrieving unique design solutions. L2DO incorporates two different algorithms – Deep Q-learning and Proximal Policy Optimization. We evaluate L2DO on two laser cavities: a long photonic crystal (PC) nanobeam and a PC nanobeam with an L3 cavity, both popular structures for semiconductor lasers. Trained for less than 152 hours on limited hardware resources, L2DO has improved state-of-the-art results in the literature by over 2 orders of magnitude and obtained 10 times better performance than a human expert working the same task for over a month. L2DO first learned to meet the required maxima of Q-factors (>50 million) and then proceeded to optimize some additional good-to-have features (e.g., resonance frequency, modal volume). Compared with iterative human designs and inverse design via supervised learning, L2DO can achieve over two orders of magnitude higher sample-efficiency without suffering from the three issues above. This work confirms the potential of deep RL algorithms to surpass human designs and marks a solid step towards a fully automated AI framework for photonics inverse design.

Halide perovskite structures of submicrometer sizes have become outstanding tools for various applications in photonics. However, despite the high potential of perovskites, their stable, scalable, and reproducible synthesis with a fine control over the size of the resulting structures (a narrow size distribution) is still challenging. In this work, we report on the synthesis of all-inorganic lead halide perovskites via droplet microfluidics, where a formed droplet acts as a sealed microreactor for perovskites' nucleation and growth. For synthesis, we use two systems with different carrier fluids (either fluorinated oil or distilled water). The developed microfluidic system enables the fabrication of perovskite particles with sizes ranging from nanometers to submicrometers with a narrow size distribution, which depends on temperature and hydrophilic-lipophilic balance. Using the advantages of this synthesis method, we obtain optically resonant submicrometer cuboid particles. We study their lasing properties upon two-photon nonlinear excitation on a metallic substrate and reveal a significant reduction of the lasing threshold down to around 230 μJ/cm2 when the pump wavelength λ corresponds to the first-order Mie resonance of the particle (at λ = 950 nm for the particle dimensions 440 × 640 × 710 nm3). Our results can be useful for the development of infrared laser beam visualizers and nonlinear imaging. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A laser model is formulated in terms of quantum harmonic oscillators. Emitters in the low lasing states are usual harmonic oscillators, and emitters in the upper states are inverted harmonic oscillators. Diffusion coefficients, consistent with the model and necessary for solving quantum nonlinear laser equations analytically, are found. Photon number fluctuations of the lasing mode and fluctuations of the population of the lasing states are calculated. Collective Rabi splitting peaks are predicted in the intensity fluctuation spectra of the superradiant lasers. Population fluctuation mechanisms in superradiant lasers and lasers without superradiance are discussed and compared with each other. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Despite the enormous technological interest in micro and nanolasers, surprisingly, no class‐B quantum density‐matrix model is available to date, capable of accurately describing coherence and photon correlations within a unified theory. In class‐B lasers—applicable for most solid‐state lasers at room temperature—, the macroscopic polarization decay rate is larger than the cavity damping rate which, in turn, exceeds the upper level population decay rate. Here, a density‐matrix theoretical approach for generic class‐B lasers is carried out, and closed equations are provided for the photonic and atomic reduced density matrix in the Fock basis of photons. Such a relatively simple model can be numerically integrated in a straightforward way, and exhibits all the expected phenomena, from one‐atom photon antibunching, to the well‐known S‐shaped input–output laser emission and super‐Poissonian autocorrelation for many atoms (1≤g(2)(0)≤2$1\le {g}^{(2)}(0)\le 2$), and from few photons (large spontaneous emission factors, β≈1$\beta \approx 1$) to the thermodynamic limit (N≫1$N\gg 1$ and β≈0$\beta \approx 0$). Based on the analysis of g(2)(τ)${g}^{(2)}(\tau)$, it is concluded that super‐Poissonian fluctuations are clearly related to relaxation oscillations in the photon number. A strong damping of relaxation oscillations with an atom number as small as N≈10$N \approx 10$ is predicted. This model enables the study of few‐photon bifurcations and nonclassical photon correlations in class‐B laser devices, also leveraging quantum descriptions of coherently coupled nanolaser arrays. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Light sources with ultra‐low energy consumption and high performance are required to realize optical interconnects for on‐chip communication. Photonic crystal (PhC) nanocavity lasers are one of the most promising candidates for this role. In this work, a continuous‐wave PhC nanolaser with an ultra‐low threshold current of 10.2 µA emitting at 1540 nm and operated at room temperature is demonstrated. The lasers are InP‐based bonded on silicon (Si), and comprise a buried heterostructure active region and lateral p–i–n junction, feature CMOS‐compatible drive voltage, and exhibit low self‐heating. Carrier leakage is a fundamental limitation of the lateral pumping scheme that is identified as unwanted spontaneous emission from the InP p–i interface, limiting the injection efficiency to 3% which further decreases at higher current. The effect of fabrication disorder and p‐doping absorption on the Q‐factor is studied experimentally showing that p‐doping limits the Q‐factor to 8000, with a p‐doping absorption coefficient of 120 cm−1. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Surface plasmons exhibit an extraordinary capability to reduce the structural size and improve light−matter interaction. However, for small‐sized plasmonic cavities, the optical diffraction limit makes the near‐field difficult to observe, complicating the analysis of exact lasing characteristics. In this study, a 4f measurement system is used to extract the mode parity from the interference pattern and reconstruct the near‐field of the hybrid plasmonic perovskite nanolasers. In conjunction with other measurements, a series of rigorous methods for determining the exact resonance mode and obtaining the precise lasing characteristics of perovskite nanolasers are described. By applying these methods, the scaling laws for wire‐type hybrid plasmonic perovskite lasers are successfully determined and an appropriate size is selected for achieving outstanding lasing performance with low threshold power consumption and a high group index. These methods can be applied to nanowire plasmon‐based lasers to advance the development of plasmonic devices. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Nanowire lasers are potential light sources that can be used in photonic integrated circuits (PICs) for inter‐chip optical communication. However, due to the size incompatibility between a nanoscale laser and a micrometer‐scale optical waveguide, their integration within a PIC remains challenging. Here, an in situ growth strategy to directly construct perovskite nanolasers inside the long polymethyl methacrylate (PMMA) fibers is explored. As the perovskite nanolasers are embedded inside the PMMA fibers, effective coupling of lasing light to the PMMA fibers is expected. Furthermore, due to the protection of PMMA coating, the perovskite nanolasers exhibit high robustness in water and demonstrate significant improvement in photostability. Stable single‐mode and polarization operations are obtained at room temperature from the lasers with a low excitation threshold. Hence, these results pave the way to realize ultra‐stable perovskite‐based PICs suitable for inter‐chip optical communication. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Plasmonic nanolasers are a new class of coherent emitters where surface plasmons are amplified by stimulated emission in a plasmonic nanocavity. In contrast to lasers, the physical size and mode volume of plasmonic nanolasers can shrink beyond the optical diffraction limit, and can be operated with faster speed and lower power consumption. It was initially proposed by Bergman and Stockman in 2003, and first experimentally demonstrated in 2009. Here we summarize our studies on the fundamental properties and applications of plasmonic nanolasers in recent years, including dark emission characterization, scaling laws, quantum efficiency, quantum threshold, gain and loss optimization, low loss plasmonic materials, sensing, and eigenmode engineering.

Lasing at the nanoscale using plasmonic nanoparticles offers the prospect of strong field concentration, hence strong light−matter interactions, low lasing thresholds, and ultrafast operation. However plasmonic nanoparticles suffer from high dissipative and radiative losses, the latter being rigidly tied to the shape of the nanoparticles and symmetry of their localized plasmon resonant modes. To overcome this limitation, recent theoretical work proposes using direct lasing into dark surface states to construct lasers that conceptually allow for independent implementation of the lasing state and its coherent radiation output. Here, lasing in dark resonant states of a metasurface laser and controllable coherent outcoupling of radiation with the aid of a tightly coupled, weakly radiative metasurface are demonstrated experimentally. The laser is implemented using a thin, low‐loss dielectric film supporting surface mode‐like dark dielectric bound states and the coupling metasurface is composed of small non‐resonant scatterers that controllably but weakly perturb the dark mode and turn it partially bright. Distinct far‐field signatures that can be observed experimentally for both dark and bright lasing are identified and demonstrated. The scalability of this design, here implemented for lasing in the near‐infrared, enables large‐aperture ultra‐thin coherent light sources with controllable emission from the infrared to the visible. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Halide perovskite micro‐ and nanolasers have become a novel platform for efficient generation of coherent emission in the whole visible range. However, the laser emission outcoupling from the perovskite microcrystals faces a number of problems related to large divergence angle, light‐soaking by a substrate, and high losses in the case of coupling with nanowaveguides. Here the perovskite nano‐ and microlasers are proposed to be integrated with a photonic crystal supporting Bloch surface waves (BSWs), which are coupled directly from the perovskite lasers with the efficiency of over 16%. The BSWs exciting at 535‐nm wavelength show high in‐plane directivity, down to 9∘${}^{\circ }$, and long‐propagation length, up to 50 μ$\umu$m. Moreover, a pronounced beam steering effect for the generated laser emission is demonstrated by varying the pumping laser beam position, which provides an additional degree of freedom for in‐plane control of the lasing mode outcoupling. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Ultra-compact III-V nanolasers monolithically integrated on Si with ultra-low energy consumption and small modal volume have been emerged as one of the most promising candidates to achieve Si on-chip light sources. However, the significant material dissimilarities between III-V and Si fundamentally limit the performance of Si-based III-V nanolasers. In this work, we report 1.3 μm InAs/GaAs quantum-dot photonic-crystal (PhC) nanobeam lasers directly grown on complementary metal-oxide-semiconductor compatible on-axis Si (001) substrates. The continuous-wave optically pumped PhC nanobeam lasers exhibited a single-mode operation, with an ultra-low lasing threshold of ∼ 0.8 μW at room temperature. In addition, a nanoscale physical volume of ∼ 8 × 0.53 × 0.36 μm3 (∼ 25 (λn−1)3) was realized through a small number of air-holes in PhC nanobeam laser. The promising characteristics of the PhC nanobeam lasers with small footprint and ultra-low energy consumption show their advanced potential towards densely integrated Si photonic integrated circuits. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Periodic arrays of air nanoholes in thin metal films that support surface plasmon resonances can provide an alternative approach for boosting the light–matter interactions at the nanoscale. Nanohole arrays have garnered great interest in recent years for their use in biosensing, light emission enhancement, and spectroscopy. Here, we employ a simple technique to fabricate nanohole arrays and examine their photonic applications including enhanced lasing and spontaneous emission of novel nanomaterials. In contrast to the complicated and most commonly used electron-beam lithography technique, hexagonal arrays of nanoholes are fabricated by using a simple combination of shadowing nanosphere lithography technique and electron-beam deposition. Through spectral and temporal characterizations, it was shown that these arrays offer an enhancement in the lasing emission of an organic dye liquid gain medium with a quality factor above 150 as well as an accelerated decay rate for CdSe quantum dots. The simple fabrication of nanohole arrays together with their excellent optical responses can therefore offer a great potential in the industrialization of plasmonic devices for use in various realms of emerging technologies such as gas sensing, biomedical imaging, and ultrafast on-chip coherent light sources. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The past two decades have seen widespread efforts being directed toward the development of nanoscale lasers. A plethora of studies on single such emitters have helped demonstrate their advantageous characteristics such as ultrasmall footprints, low power consumption, and room-temperature operation. Leveraging knowledge about single nanolasers, the next phase of nanolaser technology will be geared toward scaling up design to form arrays for important applications. In this review, we discuss recent progress on the development of such array architectures of nanolasers. We focus on valuable attributes and phenomena realized due to unique array designs that may help enable real-world, practical applications. Arrays consisting of exactly two nanolasers are first introduced since they can serve as a building block toward comprehending the behavior of larger lattices. These larger-sized lattices can be distinguished depending on whether or not their constituent elements are coupled to one another in some form. While uncoupled arrays are suitable for applications such as imaging, biosensing, and even cryptography, coupling in arrays allows control over many aspects of the emission behavior such as beam directionality, mode switching, and orbital angular momentum. We conclude by discussing some important future directions involving nanolaser arrays.

Finding the solution to a large category of optimization problems, known as the NP-hard class, requires an exponentially increasing solution time using conventional computers. Lately, there has been intense efforts to develop alternative computational methods capable of addressing such tasks. In this regard, spin Hamiltonians, which originally arose in describing exchange interactions in magnetic materials, have recently been pursued as a powerful computational tool. Along these lines, it has been shown that solving NP-hard problems can be effectively mapped into finding the ground state of certain types of classical spin models. Here, we show that arrays of metallic nanolasers provide an ultra-compact, on-chip platform capable of implementing spin models, including the classical Ising and XY Hamiltonians. Various regimes of behavior including ferromagnetic, antiferromagnetic, as well as geometric frustration are observed in these structures. Our work paves the way towards nanoscale spin-emulators that enable efficient modeling of large-scale complex networks.

Abstract We systematically studied the characteristics of hybrid perovskite-based surface plasmon nanolasers. If one changes the anion composition of perovskites, the emission wavelength can be easily tuned. We conducted in full-spectrum modeling that featured hybrid perovskite nanowires placed on different SiO2-coated metallic (Au, Ag, and Al) plates. The proposed nanocavities that supported plasmonic gap modes exhibited distinguished properties of nanolasers, such as low-transparency threshold-gain and low lasing threshold. The corresponding experimental results for the MAPbBr3 nanolaser on Ag revealed the low-threshold operation. These superior features were attributed to enhanced light-matter interaction with strong coupling. Therefore, the proposed scheme, integrated with hybrid perovskite as gain material, provides an excellent platform for nanoscale plasmon lasing in the visible to near-infrared spectra.

Nanophotonic spiking neural networks (SNNs) based on neuron-like excitable subwavelength (submicrometre) devices are of key importance for realizing brain-inspired, power-efficient artificial intelligence (AI) systems with high degree of parallelism and energy efficiency. Despite significant advances in neuromorphic photonics, compact and efficient nanophotonic elements for spiking signal emission and detection, as required for spike-based computation, remain largely unexplored. In this invited perspective, we outline the main challenges, early achievements, and opportunities toward a key-enabling photonic neuro-architecture using III–V/Si integrated spiking nodes based on nanoscale resonant tunnelling diodes (nanoRTDs) with folded negative differential resistance. We utilize nanoRTDs as nonlinear artificial neurons capable of spiking at high-speeds. We discuss the prospects for monolithic integration of nanoRTDs with nanoscale light-emitting diodes and nanolaser diodes, and nanophotodetectors to realize neuron emitter and receiver spiking nodes, respectively. Such layout would have a small footprint, fast operation, and low power consumption, all key requirements for efficient nano-optoelectronic spiking operation. We discuss how silicon photonics interconnects, integrated photorefractive interconnects, and 3D waveguide polymeric interconnections can be used for interconnecting the emitter-receiver spiking photonic neural nodes. Finally, using numerical simulations of artificial neuron models, we present spike-based spatio-temporal learning methods for applications in relevant AI-based functional tasks, such as image pattern recognition, edge detection, and SNNs for inference and learning. Future developments in neuromorphic spiking photonic nanocircuits, as outlined here, will significantly boost the processing and transmission capabilities of next-generation nanophotonic spike-based neuromorphic architectures for energy-efficient AI applications. This perspective paper is a result of the European Union funded research project ChipAI in the frame of the Horizon 2020 Future and Emerging Technologies Open programme.

Micro‐ and nanolasers are emerging optoelectronic components with many properties still to be explored and understood. On the one hand, they make it possible to address fundamental physical questions in the border area between classical physics and quantum physics, on the other hand, they open up new application perspectives in many areas of photonics. This progress report provides an overview of the exciting developments from conventional semiconductor lasers toward nanoscale lasers, whose function relies on increased light–matter interaction in low‐mode‐volume resonators and unconventional gain concepts. The latest advances in the physical understanding of light emission from high‐β lasers, in which a large part of the spontaneous emission is coupled into the laser mode, are highlighted. In the limit of β = 1, this leads to thresholdless lasing and it is shown that quantum optical characterization is required to fully explore the underlying emission processes. In addition, emerging nanolaser concepts based on Fano resonators, topological photonics, and 2D materials are presented. Open questions, future prospects, and application scenarios of high‐β lasers in integrated photonics, quantum nanophotonics, and neuromorphic computing are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Nearly half a century ago, the German physicist Hermann Haken proved that the laser dynamics could be described, under certain conditions, by the Lorenz equations, the paradigm of deterministic chaos. Unfortunately, its experimental realization has remained elusive for conventional laser materials and cavities mostly due to the extreme pumping conditions and the low cavity quality factors ("bad‐cavity condition") required to achieve Lorenz–Haken (L‐H) self‐pulsing dynamics upon continuous wave excitation. In this paper, it is theoretically proved that dielectric and plasmonic nanolasers, that can naturally fulfill the bad‐cavity condition, may overcome the limitations of macroscopic cavities and make the observation of L‐H instabilities in visible‐IR solid‐state materials become a reality. Remarkably, the adequate choice of active material and cavity design enables the generation of trains of ultrashort pulses in the sub‐ps regime and with MHz–GHz repetition rates without the need of resorting to neither mode‐locking nor Q‐switching techniques. Thus, the results reported in this manuscript unveil a new paradigm in the generation of ultrashort pulses at the nanoscale. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This in-depth analysis explores the many uses of perovskite nanorods (PNRs), which is a class of materials with remarkable optoelectronic characteristics that are produced by efficient synthesis methods. PNRs are remarkably versatile in various technological domains. The following are some of their most important applications. First, we have comprehensively described innovative/efficient manufacturing techniques that are used in order to produce high-quality properties PNRs materials. The high surface-to-volume ratio of PNRs and other optoelectronic characteristics are then useful in regards to raising solar cell efficiency. Furthermore, they are essential for light-emitting diodes (LEDs) and photodetectors (PDs), which help in order to enhance the performance in these applications. PNRs can be used in solid-state lighting by taking advantage of their special optoelectronic properties. PNRs are appropriate for various sensing applications due to their high surface-to-volume ratio, which makes advanced sensing capabilities possible. Moreover, PNRs offer advantages in non-volatile memory applications due to their resistive switching behavior, which supports resistive random-access memory (RRAM) devices. PNRs hold potential for quantum optics and communication developments in specific applications, such as polarized light detectors and nanolasers. Continuous investigations proactively tackle these matters by withstanding obstacles to stability and ecological worries, which enable PNRs to reach their maximum potential in various technological uses. The key to realizing the enormous potential of PNRs across a wide range of applications is simply to unlock their door. [Display omitted] • Perovskite nanorods (PNRs) use their high surface-to-volume ratio and optoelectronic properties to increase the efficiency of solar cells. • Essential function in enhancing LED and photodetectors' performance due to their distinct optoelectronic features. • PNRs' unique optoelectronic characteristics enable them to be used in solid-state lighting. • PNRs have a high surface-to-volume ratio that makes them appropriate for a variety of sophisticated sensing applications. • PNRs demonstrate resistive switching for non-volatile memory (RRAM) and have potential applications in quantum optics, including nanolasers and polarized light detectors. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The strong electric and magnetic resonances in dielectric subwavelength structures have enabled unique opportunities for efficient manipulation of light–matter interactions. Besides, the dramatic enhancement of nonlinear light–matter interactions near so‐called bound states in the continuum (BICs) has recently attracted enormous attention due to potential advancements. However, the experimental realizations and the applications of high‐Q factor resonances in dielectric resonances in the visible have thus far been considerably limited. In this work, the interplay of electric and magnetic dipoles in arrays of dielectric nanoresonators is explored. The experimental realization of high‐Q factor resonances in the visible through the collective diffractive coupling of electric and magnetic dipoles is reported. It is also shown that coupling the Rayleigh anomaly of the array with the dipoles of the individual nanoresonators can result in the formation of different types of BICs. The resonances in the visible regime is utilized to achieve lasing action at room temperature with high spatial directionality and low threshold. Finally, multi‐mode, directional lasing is experimentally demonstrated and the BIC‐assisted lasing mode engineering in arrays of dielectric nanoresonators is studied. It is believed that the results enable a new range of applications in flat photonics through realizing on‐chip controllable single and multi‐wavelength micro‐lasers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The past two decades have seen widespread efforts being directed toward the development of nanoscale lasers. A plethora of studies on single such emitters have helped demonstrate their advantageous characteristics such as ultrasmall footprints, low power consumption, and room-temperature operation. Leveraging knowledge about single nanolasers, the next phase of nanolaser technology will be geared toward scaling up design to form arrays for important applications. In this review, we discuss recent progress on the development of such array architectures of nanolasers. We focus on valuable attributes and phenomena realized due to unique array designs that may help enable real-world, practical applications. Arrays consisting of exactly two nanolasers are first introduced since they can serve as a building block toward comprehending the behavior of larger lattices. These larger-sized lattices can be distinguished depending on whether or not their constituent elements are coupled to one another in some form. While uncoupled arrays are suitable for applications such as imaging, biosensing, and even cryptography, coupling in arrays allows control over many aspects of the emission behavior such as beam directionality, mode switching, and orbital angular momentum. We conclude by discussing some important future directions involving nanolaser arrays. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A hybrid graphene–insulator–metal (GIM) platform is proposed with a supported surface plasmon polariton (SPP) wave that can be manipulated by breaking Lorentz reciprocity. The ZnO SPP nanowire lasers on the GIM platforms are demonstrated up to room temperature to be actively modulated by applying external current to graphene, which transforms the cavity mode from the standing to propagation wave pattern. With applying 100 mA external current, the laser threshold increases by ≈100% and a 1.2 nm Doppler shift is observed due to the nonreciprocal propagation characteristic. The nanolaser performance also depends on the orientation of the nanowire with respect to the current flow direction. The GIM platform can be a promising platform for integrated plasmonic system functioning laser generation, modulation, and detection. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Nanolasers, with small footprint and ultralow threshold, are promising for applications in data communication, on‐chip optical computing, and optical interconnects. In addition to the microcavity design, the choice of gain material is another critical factor determining the optical performance of nanolasers. 2D materials are widely studied and applied in nanoscale optoelectronic devices due to their exceptional electrical, chemical, thermal, and optical properties caused by the unique layered structures. As emerging materials with unique optical properties, 2D materials are selected as effective gain materials for designing of nanolasers. In this review, the recent advances in nanolasers based on 2D materials are comprehensively addressed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The ongoing miniaturization of semiconductor lasers has enabled ultra‐low threshold devices and even provided a path to approach thresholdless lasing with linear input–output characteristics. Such nanoscale lasers have initiated a discourse on the origin of the physical mechanisms involved and their boundaries, such as the required photon number, the importance of optimized light confinement in a resonator, and mode‐density enhancement. Here, high‐β metal‐clad coaxial nanolasers, which facilitate thresholdless lasing are investigated. Both the conventional lasing characteristics, as well as the photon statistics of the emitted light at 10 K under continuous wave excitation are experimentally and theoretically investigated. While the former lacks adequate information to determine the threshold to coherent radiation, the latter reveals a finite threshold pump power. The work confirms an important aspect of high‐β lasers, namely that a thresholdless laser does have a finite threshold pump power and must not be confused with a hypothetical zero‐threshold laser. Moreover, the results reveal an excitation power dependent β‐factor which needs to be taken into account to correctly describe the experimental data. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Nanoscale light sources are being intensively investigated for their potential to enable low-energy, high-density optical communication and sensing systems. Both nanolight-emitting diodes (nanoLEDs) and nanolasers have been considered, based on advanced nanophotonic concepts such as photonic crystals and plasmonic structures, with dimensions well into the submicrometer domain. With decreasing dimensions, light–matter interaction becomes stronger, potentially leading to efficient and ultrafast radiative emission, both in the spontaneous and stimulated regimes. These features have created wide expectations for the practical prospects of such nanoscale light sources, in particular for optical interconnects. In this paper, we examine the limits to the downscaling of LEDs and lasers and ask ourselves which type of source is most suited to ultralow-power optical communications. Based on simple physical considerations on the scaling of spontaneous and stimulated emission rates for semiconductor active regions at room temperature, we analyze the speed and energy limits for nanoLEDs and nanolasers as a function of their size. The role of spontaneous emission enhancement (Purcell effect) in practical nanophotonic sources is also revisited. The main conclusion is that nanoLEDs reach a fundamental energy/speed limit for data rates exceeding a few gigahertz per second, whereas nanolasers with active dimensions in the range of few hundred nanometers may enable direct modulation rates larger than 40 Gb/s at power levels adequate for short-distance and low-energy optical interconnects. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We systematically studied the characteristics of hybrid perovskite-based surface plasmon nanolasers. If one changes the anion composition of perovskites, the emission wavelength can be easily tuned. We conducted in full-spectrum modeling that featured hybrid perovskite nanowires placed on different SiO2-coated metallic (Au, Ag, and Al) plates. The proposed nanocavities that supported plasmonic gap modes exhibited distinguished properties of nanolasers, such as low-transparency threshold-gain and low lasing threshold. The corresponding experimental results for the MAPbBr3 nanolaser on Ag revealed the low-threshold operation. These superior features were attributed to enhanced light-matter interaction with strong coupling. Therefore, the proposed scheme, integrated with hybrid perovskite as gain material, provides an excellent platform for nanoscale plasmon lasing in the visible to near-infrared spectra. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Spontaneous photon bursts are observed in the output collected from a mesoscale semiconductor-based laser near the lasing threshold. Their appearance is compared to predictions obtained from Laser Rate Equations and from a Stochastic Laser Simulator. While the latter is capable of predicting the observed large photon bursts, the photon numbers computed by the former produces a noisy trace well below the experimentally detectable limit. We explain the discrepancy between the two approaches on the basis of an incorrect accounting of the onset of stimulated emission by the Rate Equations, which instead are capable of complementing the physical description through topological considerations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Miniaturized and rationally assembled nanostructures exhibit extraordinarily distinct physical properties beyond their individual units. This review will focus on structured small-scale optical cavities, especially on plasmonic nanoparticle lattices that show unique electromagnetic near fields from collective optical coupling. By harnessing different material systems and structural designs, various light-matter interactions can be engineered, such as nanoscale lasing, nonlinear optics, and exciton-polariton coupling. Key device performance of nanoscale lasers will be discussed, including low power threshold, output tunability, and electrical pump. This review will also cover emerging applications of nanoscale optical cavities in quantum engineering. Structured nanoscale cavities can serve as a scalable platform for integrated photonic circuits and hybrid quantum photonic systems. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The modulation properties of dually modulated mutually coupled nanolasers have been analysed using rate equations which include the Purcell cavity-enhanced spontaneous emission factor Fand the spontaneous emission coupling factor β. Specific attention is given to zero crosstalk operating regimes where the responses of the nanolasers are independent. Such regimes may provide either bidirectional isolation where both nanolasers operate independently or unidirectional-isolation where one nanolaser is immune to the other nanolaser but not vice versa. Access to the bidirectional isolation zero-crosstalk regime is, in general, enabled by strong driving or large modulation depth of the nanolasers. Conversely, strong injection coupling and low modulation depth lead to the unidirectional isolation regime. The modulation responses of the nanolasers in both bidirectional and unidirectional isolated zero crosstalk regimes are presented. The availability of bidirectional-isolated zero crosstalk regimes is seen to offer opportunities for exploitation in photonic integrated circuits.

Following a similar trend in the scaling of electronic integrated circuits (ICs), the downscaling of optical sources promises revenues such as higher energy efficiency and faster operation speed in photonic ICs. With the rapid development of advanced fabrication techniques and optical cavity designs, light confinement and manipulation at the nanoscale, far below the diffraction limit of light, have been achieved. However, downscaling can lead to problems such as large threshold current and excessive self-heating for nanolasers. In addition, the modulation bandwidth of a laser is ultimately limited by the large damping at high injection current levels due to gain compression. Recently, nanoLEDs that utilize the Purcell effect were proposed as fast and efficient nanoscale light sources to address the limitations of nanolasers. In this review, we summarize recent advances and several important figures of merit of nanoLEDs. To illustrate their practicalities, we use a specific nano-emitter design example to calculate and predict the dynamic response as well as energy consumption of the device with a rate-equation analysis. This short review is intended to offer new perspectives to the design and application of nanoscale light sources in high-speed on-chip optical communication systems.

Selective control of light is essential for optical science and technology, with numerous applications. However, optical selectivity in the angular momentum of light has been quite limited, remaining constant by increasing the incident light power on previous passive optical devices. Here, we demonstrate a nonlinear boost of optical selectivity in both the spin and orbital angular momentum of light through near-field selective excitation of single-mode nanolasers. Our designed hybrid nanolaser circuits consist of plasmonic metasurfaces and individually placed perovskite nanowires, enabling subwavelength focusing of angular-momentum-distinctive plasmonic fields and further selective excitation of nanolasers in nanowires. The optically selected nanolaser with a nonlinear increase of light emission greatly enhances the baseline optical selectivity offered by the metasurface from about 0.4 up to near unity. Our demonstrated hybrid nanophotonic platform may find important applications in all-optical logic gates and nanowire networks, ultrafast optical switches, nanophotonic detectors, and on-chip optical and quantum information processing.

Rubidium lead halides (RbPbX3), an important class of all‐inorganic metal halide perovskites, are attracting increasing attention for photovoltaic applications. However, limited by its lower Goldschmidt tolerance factor t≈0.78, all‐inorganic RbPbBr3 has not been reported. Now, the crystal structure, X‐ray diffraction (XRD) pattern, and band structure of perovskite‐phase RbPbBr3 has now been investigated. Perovskite‐phase RbPbBr3 is unstable at room temperature and transforms to photoluminescence (PL)‐inactive non‐perovskite. The structural evolution and mechanism of the perovskite–non‐perovskite phase transition were clarified in RbPbBr3. Experimentally, perovskite‐phase RbPbBr3 was realized through a dual‐source chemical vapor deposition and annealing process. These perovskite‐phase microspheres showed strong PL emission at about 464 nm. This new perovskite can serve as a gain medium and microcavity to achieve broadband (475–540 nm) single‐mode lasing with a high Q of about 2100. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Josephson effects are commonly studied in quantum systems in which dissipation or noise can be neglected or do not play a crucial role. In contrast, here we discuss a setup where dissipative interactions do amplify a photonic Josephson current, opening a doorway to dissipation-enhanced sensitivity of quantum-optical interferometry devices. In particular, we study two coupled nanolasers subjected to phase coherent drivings and coupled by a coherent photon tunneling process. We describe this system by means of a Fokker–Planck equation and show that it exhibits an interesting non-equilibrium phase diagram as a function of the coherent coupling between nanolasers. As we increase that coupling, we find a non-equilibrium phase transition between a phase-locked (PL) and a non-phase-locked (NPL) steady-state, in which phase coherence is destroyed by the photon tunneling process. In the coherent, PL regime, an imbalanced photon number population appears if there is a phase difference between the nanolasers, which appears in the steady-state as a result of the competition between competing local dissipative dynamics and the Josephson photo-current. The latter is amplified for large incoherent pumping rates and it is also enchanced close to the lasing phase transition. We show that the Josephson photocurrent can be used to measure optical phase differences. In the quantum limit, the accuracy of the two nanolaser interferometer grows with the square of the photon number and, thus, it can be enhanced by increasing the rate of incoherent pumping of photons into the nanolasers.

A new approach for analytically solving quantum nonlinear Langevin equations is proposed and applied to calculations of spectra of superradiant lasers where collective effects play an important role. We calculate lasing spectra for arbitrary pump rates and recover well-known results such as the pump dependence of the laser linewidth across the threshold region. We predict new sideband peaks in the spectrum of superradiant lasers with large relaxation oscillations as well as new nonlinear structures in the lasing spectra for weak pump rates. Our approach sheds new light on the importance of population fluctuations in the narrowing of the laser linewidth, in the structure of the lasing spectrum, and in the transition to coherent operation.

Plasmonic nanolasers are promising as nanoscale coherent sources of optical fields because they support ultrasmall sizes and show ultrafast dynamics. Major advances over the last several years have focused on nanocavity design, materials improvements in quality of both the plasmonic materials and gain media, and room-temperature operation. In 2014, the most significant results focused on tunable nanolasing emission and strategies to time-resolve the dynamics.

Simultaneous suppression of time delay (TD) signature in all observables of optical chaos emission, i.e. in both intensity and phase, has been achieved using two or more semiconductor laser (SL) sources or using two independent polarization components of single vertical cavity surface-emitting laser (VCSEL). In this paper, we examine for the first time the simultaneous TD feature suppression using a single nanolaser of single polarization state. The influence of hybrid optical/electrooptic feedback schemes employing either conventional, phase-conjugate, or grating mirror is evaluated. The concealment of TD signature is then investigated by means of the autocorrelation function. The results reveal the operational regions in each case with well eliminated TD signature in all observables. A secure communications system utilizing chaotic nanolaser is presented. Security analysis for a message transmitted in the form of a colored image is carried out which verifies the immunity of the system against possible statistical, brute force and differential attacks. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Nanoscale semiconductor lasers have been developed recently using either metal, metallo-dielectric, or photonic crystal nanocavities. While the technology of nanolasers is steadily being deployed, their expected performance for on-chip optical interconnects is still largely unknown due to a limited understanding of some of their key features. Specifically, as the cavity size is reduced with respect to the emission wavelength, the stimulated and the spontaneous emission rates are modified, which is known as the Purcell effect in the context of cavity quantum electrodynamics. This effect is expected to have a major impact in the "threshold-less" behavior of nanolasers and in their modulation speed; but its role is poorly understood in practical laser structures, characterized by significant homogeneous and inhomogeneous broadening and by a complex spatial distribution of the active material and cavity field. In this paper, we investigate the role of the Purcell effect in the stimulated and spontaneous emission rates of semiconductor lasers taking into account the carriers' spatial distribution in the volume of the active region over a wide range of cavity dimensions and emitter/cavity linewidths, enabling the detailed modeling of the static and dynamic characteristics of either micro- or nano-scale lasers using single-mode rate-equations analysis. The ultimate limits of scaling down these nanoscale light sources in terms of Purcell enhancement and modulation speed are also discussed showing that the ultrafast modulation properties predicted in nanolasers are a direct consequence of the enhancement of the stimulated emission rate via reduction of the mode volume. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]