K .

THARUN VIVEKANANDA

UNIT-V: FIBER OPTICAL SOURCES

INTRODUCTION: -

• A basic fiber optic communication system - essentially three components - an optical source,
an optical fiber of the required length, and a photo detector.

• The role of an optical source is to convert the input electrical signal into an optical signal.

• The major requirements of the optical sources are:

– Ability to directly modulate the intensity,

– Compatibility to optical fibers- in terms of the operating wavelengths and power coupling

– Smaller spectral widths, and reasonable optical power outputs

• Because of these requirements the most suitable optical sources are semiconductor

• Light Emitting Diodes [LEDs]

• Laser Diodes [LDs].

OPTICAL SOURCES: BASIC CONCEPTS:-

• Semiconductors are special materials whose conduction properties lie between those of
metals and insulators.

• The conduction properties of a

semiconductor - energy band diagrams.

• The valence electrons occupy a band of

energy levels called the Valance band, which is
the lowest band of allowed states.

• The next higher band of allowed energy levels for electrons is called the Conduction band.

• Si – 4 group element – 4 valance electrons

• 3 or 5 group elements – doping

• Energy gap – 1.1 ev

• The valance and conduction bands are separated by an energy gap where no energy levels
exist.
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• At absolute zero temperature with no applied electric field, all the electrons will be in the
valance band [energy level E1].

• When some external energy is provided to the electrons at the valence band, some of them
acquire enough energy [the excited electrons] to jump over the energy gap and reached to
conduction band[energy level E2].

• The excited electron will get de-excited after every 10-8 sec itself or recombine with hole in
valance band.

• When excited electron falls from the conduction band [energy level E 2] to valance band
[energy level E1], it releases [radiates] a quantum of energy called Photon [emission].

where h is Planck’s constant =6.626 x 10-34 J , C is the speed of the light,

λ is wavelength.

• In order to have radiation it is necessary to excite many electrons to the conduction band

• This needs to be done in the form of an external energy. The most suitable way of doing this
is by passing an electric current through the semiconductor.

• When a p-type material is brought in contact with a n-type material a pn junction is formed.

• PN junction can be formed by either direct band gap material [Ex: GaAS, GaN, InAs, InP] or
indirect band gap material [Ex: Si, Ge]

• In direct band gap materials the maxima of valence band and the minima of the conduction
band occur at the same value of crystal momentum k. But k is different in indirect band gap
materials.

• When an external voltage is applied to a forward bias pn junction made of direct band gap
material, electron and holes recombine radiatively or non-radiatively.

• For every radiative recombination of electron hole pair, energy equal to photon will be
released [radiated] in the form of light.

• For non-radiative recombination energy will be dissipated in the form of heat.

•
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LIGHT EMITTING DIODES (LEDs) :-

• LED’s are best light sources for Optical Communication systems.

• LED’s require less complex driven circuitry than laser diodes.

• No thermal or optical stabilization circuits are needed.

• They can be fabricated less expensively with higher yields.

• In fiber transmission applications, LED must have

– a high radiance O/P,

– a fast emission response time

– high quantum efficiency.

• RADIANCE O/P is optical power radiated into a unit solid angle per unit area of the emitting
surface. It is measured in Watts.

• EMISSION RESPONSE TIME is the time delay between application of current pulse and the
unset of optical emission.

• QUANTUM EFFICIENCY is related to fraction of injected electron-hole pairs that

recombine radiatively.

• To achieve a high radiance and high quantum efficiency, the LED structure must provide a
means of confining the charge carriers and stimulated optical emission to active region of pn
junction where radiative recombination takes place..

LED STRUCTURES:-

• A simple LED may be constructed by forming a pn junction using one of the direct band gap
semiconductors.

• Such an LED is called a HOMOJUNCTION LED as the pn junction is made the same
material.

• In order to have a device with high radiance and high quantum efficiency the LED structure
must provide means of carrier confinement and optical confinement.

• Carrier confinement would improve the radiance and internal quantum efficiency.

• Emitted photons can get absorbed by the surrounding materials,

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which can be prevented by better optical confinement.

• Carrier and optical confinement can be achieved by the use of single and double
HETEROJUNCTIONS.

• In a heterojunction pn device, the junction is formed out of dissimilar crystalline

semiconductors.

• A combination of multiple heterojunctions together in a device is called heterostructure.

• In a heterostructure LED the device has an active region, catering to radiative recombination,
sandwiched between two different alloy layers.

• The 2 basic LED configurations used for fiber optics are

1) Surface emitters or Burrus or front emitters.

2) Edge emitters.

SURFACE EMITTERS LED:-

• The plane of active light emitting region is oriented perpendicularly to the axis of the fiber.

• A well is etched through the substract of the device, into which a fiber is then cemented in
order to accept the emitted light.

• The emission pattern is essentially isotropic with a 120 degrees half power beam width. This
isotropic pattern from a surface emitter is called Lambertian pattern.

• In this pattern the source is equally bright when viewed from any direction, but the power is
diminishing as Cosθ , where θ is angle between viewing direction and normal to the surface.
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EDGE EMITTER LED :-

• The edge emitter consists of an active junction region, which is source of the incoherent light
and two guiding layers.

• The guiding layers both have a refractive index which is lower than that of active region but
higher than index of surrounding material.

• This structure forms a wave guide channel that directs the optical radiation towards the fiber
core.

• The radiation emits to air from the active area edge of the device.

• Contact strips are made to match the edge emitter active area compatible to optical fibers.

• The beam emitting from the edge emitter LED is more directional than SELED.

• The beam is generally Elliptical.

• Due to waveguiding effect the beam is narrower in the plane perpendicular to the pn
junction-the full width at half maximum [FWHM] is typically 25 to 350.

• However, since there is no waveguiding in lateral direction, i.e. in the plane parallel to the
junction, the beam in the plane is Lambertian with a FWHM OF 120 0.
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MATERIALS:-

• The semiconductor material that is used for active layer of an optical source must have direct
band gap. In a direct-band-gap electrons & holes can recombine directly without third
particle to conserve momentum.

• III & V group elements are used. III group elements (Al, Ga or In) & V group elements (P,
As or Sb) compounds are used. Combinations of binary compounds of these elements are
also direct gap materials and are suitable for optical sources.

• For operation in the 800-900 nm spectrum, principal material is Ga(1-x) Alx As. The
value of x for active area material is usually chosen to give an emission wave length of 800 to 850 nm.

• At longer wave lengths In(1-x) Gax Asy P1-y is one of primary material. By varying
mole fractions x & y in active area, LEDs with peak out power can be constructed. Other notations
such as AlGaAs, (AlGa)As, (GaAl)As, GaInPAs & InxGa1-xAsyP1-y are also used.

Internal Quantum Efficiency:-

• An excess of electrons & holes in P-type & N-type materials respectively is created in a
semiconductor light source by carrier injection at the device contacts. When the carrier
injection stops the carrier density returns to equilibrium value.

• Excess carrier density decays exponentially with time according to relation

∆𝑛 = ∆𝑛0𝑒−𝑡/𝑐

where ∆𝑛0 = initial injected excess electron density.

τ = carrier life time.

• The excess carriers can recombine either radiatively or non- radiatively. In radiative
recombination a photon of energy hv, equal to band gap energy is emitted.

• In non-radiative recombination, the energy is emitted in the form of heat. Internal quantum
efficiency in active region is fraction of electron-hole pair that recombines radiatively.
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LED POWER:-

• It may be noted that the surface emitter radiates significantly more optical power into air than
the edge emitter, and that both devices are reasonably linear at moderate drive currents.

• The internal quantum efficiency of LEDs decreases exponentially with increasing

temperature. Hence the light emitted from these devices decreases as the p–n junction
temperature increases.

MODULATION OF LED:-

• In order to transmit information via an optical fiber communication system it is necessary to

modulate a property of the light with the information signal.

• This property may be intensity, frequency, phase or polarization (direction) with either digital
or analog signals.

• The choices are considered by the characteristics of the optical fiber, the available optical
sources and detectors, and considerations of the overall system. Intensity modulation – Direct
detection at the optical detector.

• These devices can be directly modulated simply by variation of their drive currents at rates up
to many gigahertz.

• Intensity modulation may be utilized with both digital and analog signals.

• Analog intensity modulation is usually easier to apply but requires comparatively large
signal-to-noise ratios and therefore it tends to be limited to relatively narrow-bandwidth,
short-distance applications.

• Alternatively, digital intensity modulation gives improved noise immunity but requires wider
bandwidths, although these may be small in comparison with the available bandwidth.
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• It is therefore ideally suited to optical fiber transmission where the available bandwidth is
large. Hence at present most fiber systems in the medium- to long-distance range use digital
intensity modulation.

• Response time of an light source - how fast an electrical input signal varies light output
level.

• 3 factors

• Doping level in active region

• Injected carrier lifetime

• Parasitic capacitance of LED

• If the driven current is modulated at a frequency ω, the optical

LASER DIODES:-

• Response time less than 1nsec

• Spectral width of 2nm

• Capable of coupling 10 to 100 mw of power into small cores &

small MFD OF’s

• LASER action is the result of 3 key process

1) ABSORPTION

2) SPANTANEOUS EMISSION

3) STIMULATED EMISSION

• POPULATION INVERSION
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• PUMPING TECHNIQUE

• The 3 key transition processes involved in laser action

• The radiation in one type of laser diode configuration is generated within a Fabry-Perot
resonant cavity.

• This cavity is much smaller, being approximately 250-500µm long in longitudinal, 5-15µm
wide in lateral, 0.1-0.2µm thick in transverse.

• Fabry-Perot resonator cavity for a laser diode

• Two flat, partially reflecting mirrors are directed towards each other to enclose Fabry-Perot
resonator cavity.

• The purpose of mirrors is to establish a strong optical feedback in the longitudinal direction.
The feedback mechanism converts the device into an oscillation.

• Fabry-Perot resonator cavity for a laser diode

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• Amplification occurs for selected wavelengths, also called laser modes; reflect back and forth
through the cavity.

• For lasing to occur, the optical gain of the selected modes must exceed the optical loss during
one round-trip through the cavity. This process is referred to as optical feedback .

• MODES & THRESHOLD CONDITIONS

• The optical radiation within the resonance cavity of laser diode sets up a pattern of electric &
magnetic field lines called the modes of cavity.

• These lines are separated into 2 independent set of TE & TM modes.

MODES:-

• Each set of modes can be described in terms of longitudinal, lateral & transverse EM fields
along the major axes of the cavity.

• LONGITUDINAL MODES are related to the length L of cavity & determine the principal
structure of the frequency spectrum of emitted optical radiation.

• LATERAL MODES lie in the plane of pn junction. These modes depends upon side walls &
width of the cavity, determines shape of lateral profile of laser beam.

• TRANSVERSE MODES associated with EM field & beam profile in the direction
perpendicular to the plane of pn junction, determines laser characteristics & threshold current
density.
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LASING CONDITION:-

• LASING is the condition at which light amplification becomes possible in the laser diode.
Requirement for lasing is that population inversion be achieved. To determine lasing
condition, consider EM propagation in longitudinal direction

• E(z,t)= 𝐼 𝑧 𝑒𝑗(ω𝑡−β𝑧) ------------ (1)

Where I(z) = optical field intensity

ω is the optical radian frequency

β is the propagation constant

• The radiation intensity at a photon energy(hv) varies exponentially with the

distance z.

• I(z) = I(0) 𝑒Γ 𝑔 ℎν −ᾶ(ℎν) 𝑧

• Where ᾶ = effective absorption co-efficient in optical path,

• Γ = optical confinement factor

• τ = optical field confinement factor,

• g = gain co-efficient in Fabry-Perot cavity,

• z = distance along lasing cavity.

• Lasing occurs when the gain of one or several guided modes is sufficient to exceed the
optical loss during one round trip through the cavity i.e., z = 2L

• During this round trip, only the fractions R1 & R2 of the optical radiation are reflected from
the 2 laser ends 1& 2 respectively, where R1 & R2 are mirror reflexives or Fresnel reflection
co-efficient, which are given by
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• At lasing threshold, a steady-state oscillation takes place. The magnitude & phase of the
returned wave must be equal to those of the original wave. This gives the condition

I(2L) = I(0) for amplitude ----------- (3)

𝑒−𝑗2𝛽𝐿 = 1 for phase ------------ (4)

• Equation (4) gives information about resonant frequency of the Fabry-Perot cavity. Equation
(3) gives information about which modes have sufficient gain for sustained oscillations.

• LASING THRESHOLD is the point at which the optical gain is equal to the total loss αt in
the cavity. From equation (3) laser gain threshold

where αend = the mirror loss in lasing cavity.

• Therefore lasing may occur when gain g ≥ gth

• i.e. pumping source that maintain strong population inversion must be sufficiently strong to
support or exceed all energy consuming mechanisms within the lasing cavity. The mode that
satisfies equation (5) reaches threshold first.

Optical output power Vs Laser diode driven current :-

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• At low diode currents, only spontaneous radiation is emitted. The spectral beam and lateral
beam width of emission are broad as like that of an LED.

• Sharp increase in power output occurs at lasing threshold. At this transition approach, the
spectral width & beam width both get narrowed with increase in current.

• The threshold current Ith is conventionally defined by extrapolation of the lasing region of the
power vs current curve.

• At the higher output, the slope of the curve decreases because of junction heating. The
relationship between lasing threshold optical gain & threshold current density J th is

gth = β Jth -------------------(6) where β is constant.

LASER DIODE RATE EQUATION:-

• The relation between optical output power and the diode driven current can be determined by
rate equations.

• The total carrier population is determined by carrier injection, pontaneous recombination &
stimulated emission.

• For a pn junction with a carrier-confinement region of depth ‘d’, the rate equations are given
by
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• Adding equations (5) & (6) using (4), then no. of photons per unit volume can be written as
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• In equation (7), the first term is no. of photons resulting from stimulated emission. The power
generated in concentrated in one or two modes.

• The second term gives spontaneously generated photons. The power resulting from these
photons is not mode selective but spread over all the possible modes.

EXTERNAL QUANTUM EFFICIENCY:-

RESONANT FREQUIENCIES :-
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RESONANT FREQUIENCIES :-

• Since in all lasers the gain is a function of frequency or wavelength, there will be a range of
frequencies or wavelengths for which equation (3) holds.

• Each of these frequencies corresponds to a mode of oscillation in the laser. Depending on the
laser structure, any number of frequencies can satisfy equation (1) & (2).

• The relationship between gain and frequency can be assumed to have the Gaussian form

• Where λ0 is the wavelength at the center of the spectrum, σ is the spectrum width of the gain,
and the maximum gain g(0) is proportional to the population inversion.

• Thus some lasers are single-mode and some are multimode.

Typical spectrum from a gain-guided GaAlAs/GaAs laser diode.

• The frequency or wavelength spacing between the modes can be derived by considering only
the longitudinal modes.

• To find frequency spacing, consider two successive modes of frequencies fm-1 & fm
represented by the integer’s m-1 & m. From equation (3)
 K . THARUN VIVEKANANDA

TEMPERATURE EFFECTS:-

• An important factor to consider in the application of laser diodes is temperature dependence

of the threshold current Ith(T).

• The temperature variation of Ith can be approximated by the empirical expression

Ith(T) = Iz eT/To

where T0 is a measure of the relative temperature insensitivity and Iz is constant..

PHOTO DETECTORS :-

• The Photo Detector senses the luminescent power falling and converts the variation of the
optical power into a corresponding varying electric current.

• The Photo Detector must meet very high performance requirements those are with high
response or sensitivity in the emission wavelength.
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• In OFC system there must be a receiving device which interprets the information contained
in the optical signal.

• The first element of this receiver is a photo detector.

• Different types of photo detectors are in existence.

• They are Photo multipliers, Pyroelectric detectors, Photo diodes.

Photodiode:

 Photodiode is used almost fiber optic systems

because of its

i. Small size, Suitable material,

ii. High sensitivity &

iii. Fast response time.

Two types of photo diodes used are

 PIN photo detector

 Avalanche Photo diode [APD]

PIN PHOTO DETECTOR:-

• The most commonly used photo detector is the photodiode.

• The device structure consists of p & n regions separated by a very

lightly n-doped intrinsic region.

• In normal operation a sufficiently large reverse bias voltage is applied across the
device so that the intrinsic region is fully depleted of carriers.

• So, the intrinsic n-carrier and p-carrier concentration is negligibly

small and it is compared with impurity concentration.

• When an incident photon has energy greater than or equal to the band-gap energy, the photon
can give up its energy and exit an electron from valance band to the conduction band.

• This process generates free electron-hole pairs which are known as photo carriers (or)
Photon-generated charge carriers.
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• The carriers are generated in depletion region where most of incident light is
observed.

\
• This gives a current flow in an external circuit, with electron flow for every carrier pair
generated. This current flow is known as photo current.
• As the charge carrier flow through the material, some electron- hole will recombine &
hence disappear.
• The charge carrier travels at distance Ln or Lp for electrons and holes respectively. This
distance is known as diffusion length.
• The time it takes for an electron or hole to recombination is known as carrier life time & is
represented by Ƭ n & Ƭp respectively.
• Life times & diffusion lengths are related by L n=(Dn Ƭn)1/2 , Lp=(Dp Ƭp)1/2
where Dn & Dp are electron and hole diffusion coefficients.
 K . THARUN VIVEKANANDA

AVALANCHE PHOTO DETECTOR[APD]:-

• APDs internally multiply the primary signal photocurrent before it enters the input circuitry
and it increases receiver sensitivity.
• The photocurrent is multiplied before encountering the thermal noise associated with the
receiver circuit.
• In order for carrier multiplication to take place, the photo generated carriers must traverse a
region where very high electric field is present. There the carrier multiplication takes
mechanism is known as impact ionization.
• The newly created carriers are also accelerated with high electric field, thus gaining enough
energy to cause further impact ionization.
• The phenomenon of impact ionization is called as Avalanche Effect..
• A commonly used structure for achieving carrier multiplication with very little excess noise
is the reach through construction which is shown in image.
• The Reach-through avalanche photo diode(RAPD) is composed of high-resistivity p-type
material deposited as an epitaxial layer on a p+[ heavily doped p-type ] substrate.
• A p-type diffusion or ion implant is then made in the high- resistive material followed by
construction of an n+[ heavily doped ] layer. This configuration is referred to as a p+Пpn+
reach through structure.
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•
• The average no. of electron hole pairs created by a carrier per unit distance traveled is called
the ionization rate. The multiplication M for all carriers generated in the photodiode is
M=Im/Ip where Im= average value of the total multiplied
output current. Ip= the primary unmultiplied photo current.

PHOTODETECTOR NOISE & SNR:-

• Detection of the weakest possible optical signals requires that the photo detector and its
following amplification circuit to optimize so that a given SNR is maintained.
• The SNR at the output of an optical receiver is defined by

𝑆 𝑆𝑖𝑔𝑛𝑎𝑙 𝑝𝑜𝑤𝑒𝑟 𝑓𝑟𝑜𝑚 𝑝ℎ𝑜𝑡𝑜 𝑐𝑢𝑟𝑟𝑒𝑛𝑡

=
𝑁 𝑃ℎ𝑜𝑡𝑜 𝑑𝑒𝑡𝑒𝑐𝑡𝑜𝑟 𝑁𝑜𝑖𝑠𝑒 𝑝𝑜𝑤𝑒𝑟+𝐴𝑚𝑝𝑙𝑖𝑓𝑖𝑒𝑟 𝑁𝑜𝑖𝑠𝑒 𝑃𝑜𝑤𝑒𝑟
• Photo detector noise resulting from statistical nature of photon to electron conversion
process.
• Thermal noise associated with amplifier circuitry.
K . THARUN VIVEKANANDA
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DETECTOR RESPONSE TIME :-

• The response time of photo diode together with its output circuit depends mainly on the
allowing 3 factors:
i. the transit time of the photo carrier in the depletion region.
ii. The diffusion time of the photo carriers generated outside the depletion region.
i. the RC time constant of the photodiode and its associated circuit.
• Photo diode parameters responsible for 3 factors –
absorption coefficient αs,
depletion region width w,
photodiode junction & package capacitance, the amplifier capacitance, the detector load resistance,
the amplifier input resistance and photo diode series resistance.
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• To achieve a high quantum efficiency, the depletion region width must be much larger then
1/ αs i.e., w >> 1/ αs

Figure 3: Photodiode pulse response under various detector parameters.

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TEMPERATURE EFFECT ON AVALANCHE GAIN:-

COMPARISIONS OF PHOTO DETECTORS :-

• Summarizes some generic operating characteristics of Si, Ge & InGaAs photo diodes. For
pin photo diodes
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• For avalanche photo diodes