Simulation of photonic-crystal surface-emitting lasers with air-hole and air-pillar structures

Photonic-crystal surface-emitting lasers (PC-SELs), with and without regrowth, are theoretically simplified as air-hole and air-pillar structures, respectively. In this paper, square-latticed air-hole and air-pillar PC-SELs are simulated by a three-dimensional coupled-wave theory model and the design guideline is illustrated with a PC basis of a right isosceles triangular and double circular shapes. The optimum PC filling factor is determined by infinite PC cavity analysis and the slope efficiency of finite-size PC-SEL is then calculated for the lowest threshold band-edge mode. In comparison with air-hole PC-SEL, air-pillar PC-SEL exhibits lower threshold gain, larger gain discrimination but lower slope efficiency. To achieve slope efficiency of comparable value, the cavity area of air-pillar PC-SEL is about four times larger than that of air-hole PC-SEL.