SEMICONDUCTOR OPTICAL ELEMENT AND WAVELENGTH SWEEPING LIGHT SOURCE USING THE SAME

摘要

PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To provide a semiconductor optical element high in response speed of deflection of outgoing light; and to provide a wavelength sweeping light source including the semiconductor optical element and capable of suppressing mode hop in wavelength sweeping in real time. SOLUTION: The semiconductor optical element includes: an n-type semiconductor substrate 21; a light-emitting region 22 formed on the n-type semiconductor substrate 21, emitting light and having an active layer 24 for transmitting the light; and a refractive index adjustment region 23 optically-coupled to the active layer 24 of the light-emitting region 22, having a waveguide layer 26 for transmitting light transmitted from the active layer 24, and adjusting an equivalent refractive index of the waveguide layer 26 in response to an injected refractive index adjustment region injection current Ir; wherein the intersection angle θ1between an emission end face 20a on the refractive index adjustment region 23 side and the optical axis of the waveguide layer 26 is a non-right angle, an equivalent refractive index n1of the waveguide layer 26 is adjusted by the refractive index adjustment region injection current Ir, and thereby an emission angle θ2of light emitted from the emission end face 20a with respect to the emission end face 20a is varied. COPYRIGHT: (C)2010,JPO&INPIT