SURFACE EMITTING LASER DEVICE, OPTICAL MODULE AND METHOD FOR DRIVING SURFACE EMITTING LASER ELEMENT

摘要

A surface emitting laser device comprises: a surface emitting laser element (102); and a drive device for providing the surface emitting laser element (102) with modulation drive current intensity-modulated by sandwiching a bias current. The number of transverse modes changes from 1 to 3 at most in accordance with the value of the modulation drive current in the laser oscillation generated by the surface emitting laser element (102). A switch current causes the number of transverse modes in the laser oscillation generated by the surface emitting laser element (102) to change, and the drive device supplies the surface emitting laser element with the modulation drive current which was set so that a first switch current is not included between the bias current and the maximum value of the modulation drive current, where the first switch current is the switch current that causes the number of transverse modes in the laser oscillation to change from 1 to 2. This configuration will control the deterioration in the signal beam quality, and thus make it possible to provide a surface emitting laser device, an optical module, and a method for driving a surface emitting laser element, which have favorable modulation characteristics.