Abstract: Laser diodes are formed with an outcoupling grating between two separate distributed Bragg reflectors. The devices have gain regions located between the reflector gratings for pumping the active region. The outcoupling grating couples light out of the waveguide normal to the surface if the grating spacings are equal to an integer number of wavelengths of the light within the cavity. If the gratings are not such an integer number, the light is coupled out of the cavity off the normal.

Abstract: A traveling-wave, surface-emitting-optical-waveguide amplifier uses Bragg gratings to provide both confinement in the lateral direction and couple light out of the waveguide plane. The grating lines are parallel to the direction of flow of the optical mode in the traveling-wave amplifier and result in emission along the entire length of the amplifier. The parallel grating does not cause feedback into the optical mode so that laser oscillation in the traveling wave amplifier is avoided. At the same time the continuous output coupling provided by the grating avoids the deleterious effect of power saturation. In this way coherent light is emitted from a very wide and long area resulting in very high power and outstanding low beam divergence. A DFB or DBR laser may be included monolithically as the power source for the amplifier and to obtain a Master-oscillator-power amplifier (MOPA) with outstanding performance.

Abstract: Laser diodes are formed with an outcoupling grating between two separate distributed Bragg reflectors. The devices have gain regions located between the reflector gratings for pumping the active region. The outcoupling grating couples light out of the waveguide normal to the surface if the grating spacings are equal to an integer number of wavelengths of the light within the cavity. If the gratings are not such an integer number, the light is coupled out of the cavity off the normal.

Abstract: A band-stop wavelength filter and TE-TM mode selector made using an absorptive layer on an optical waveguide is provided. At the correct thickness, refractive index, absorptive loss, and location of the absorptive layer, a relatively high fraction of guided-mode intensity flows in the absorptive layer for one polarization mode. A much smaller fraction flows for the perpendicular polarization mode and for wavelengths on both sides of the design center. The result is a broad-band-stop filter for the selected polarization mode. This device is capable of strong discrimination between TE and TM modes over a very broad bandwidth.

Abstract: A band-stop wavelength filter and TE-TM mode selector made using an absorptive layer on an optical waveguide is provided. At the correct thickness, refractive index, absorptive loss, and location of the absorptive layer, a relatively high fraction of guided-mode intensity flows in the absorptive layer for one polarization mode. A much smaller fraction flows for the perpendicular polarization mode and for wavelengths on both sides of the design center. The result is a broad-band-stop filter for the selected polarization mode. This device is capable of strong discrimination between TE and TM modes over a very broad bandwidth.

Abstract: Two or more laser diodes are combined by crossing their cavities, and the multiple lasers share a common outcoupling aperture. By controlling the quantum wells in the active region, crosstalk between the devices can be eliminated. The multiple devices can also be made to crosstalk, and can be made coherent with respect to one another by mixing enough photons to phase lock the devices.

Abstract: Two or more laser diodes are combined by crossing their cavities, and the multiple lasers share a common outcoupling aperture. By controlling the quantum wells in the active region, crosstalk between the devices can be eliminated. The multiple devices can also be made to crosstalk, and can be made coherent with respect to one another by mixing enough photons to phase lock the devices.

Abstract: Laser diodes are formed with an outcoupling grating between two separate distributed Bragg reflectors. The devices have gain regions located between the reflector gratings for pumping the active region. The outcoupling grating couples light out of the waveguide normal to the surface if the grating spacings are equal to an integer number of wavelengths of the light within the cavity. If the gratings are not such an integer number, the light is coupled out of the cavity off the normal.

Abstract: A technique for generating long narrow microstructures based upon the shadowing effect of thick slits placed between a source and a substrate. The method is particularly well suited for forming optical waveguides using a mask having a slit with a width larger than the width of the stripe to be deposited and being thick relative to the width of said slit.

Abstract: More efficient optical coupling between light wave energy traveling in a fiber-optic, which may be a multimode fiber-optic, and single or few mode light wave energy traveling in a planar optical waveguide is accomplished by deforming the initially cylindrical shape of the coupled portion of the fiber-optic core, such as by flattening the coupled portion of the fiber-core in a direction substantially perpendicular to the plane of the planar optical waveguide and fanning out this portion of the fiber-optic core in a direction substantially parallel to the plane of the planar optical waveguide.

Abstract: The optical efficiency, with which a coupling portion of a fiber-optic can be coupled by evanescent fields to a planar optical waveguide through a phase-matching diffraction grating on the surface of the planar optical waveguide, is increased by deforming the coupling portion so that it is a negative replica of the undulating surface of the diffraction grating.

Abstract: An electro-optic modulator wherein a light waveguide is in the form of a film disposed on a prismatic substrate and beneath modulating electrodes. The substrate has opposite end faces disposed at predetermined angles to its longitudinal axis and cooperates with grating couplers on the waveguide to direct an entrance beam through the waveguide and to provide an exit beam along a predetermined path relative, e.g., parallel, to the entrance beam.

Abstract: By coupling light from a coupling portion of a thin fiber core to a planar waveguide film through the thickness of the substrate supporting the film, sufficient spreading by diffraction takes place in the light traveling through the thickness of the substrate to provide an aperture at the film large enough to permit light coupled into the film from the substrate to have a substantially plane wavefront.