Wavefront measurements on semiconductor lasers

Abstract
Two-dimensional phase measurements of the far field of semiconductor lasers have been performed. An accuracy of one fiftieth of a wavelength has been obtained. In this paper, we will briefly describe the method used and present some results. It was possible to determine the neat-field behavior of both the amplitude and the phase from the measured fat-field wavefront and the far-field intensity distribution. Some results are given of a double heterojunction gain guided Al-Ga-As semiconductor laser. The near field calculated from measured far-field data agrees with the results of the directly measured near field.