Technologies – UNISON PROJECT

Discover more of the technologies utilized in the UNISON project :

Infrared light, especially of wavelength between 3 and 12 µm, holds the key for the development of compact, battery-powered chemical sensors for a plethora of applications, including medical diagnostics, environmental monitoring and process control. However, it remains challenging to build adequate light sources for these sensors. There are mainly two technologies: quantum cascade lasers (QCL), which, over the last 3 decades, have matured into a commercially available platform, and interband cascade lasers (ICL), a much younger technology in that sense. When building sensors, having a light source that emits not one color, but a whole spectrum is key to detecting multiple species at once with a single device. One way to do that, is to drive the laser in a state, where it emits ultra-short pulses of light. This has been shown for visible light lasers. Since the ICL is a somewhat related technology, in contrast to QCLs, a lot of research went into getting it to emit pulses. Our current publication reveals why noone has succeeded in this endeavour so far: a design choice in their quantum heterostructure, which drastically boosts their performance, unfortunately also prevents this pulsed state. We suggest possible design changes to overcome this issue and set a new path for achieving this long-sought goal.