Control of molecular packing toward a lateral microresonator for microlaser array

Abstract

Nanowire laser arrays for integrated on-chip optical interconnects demand the uniformity of lasing wavelengths from different modules, which, however, is challenging owing to inevitable heterogeneity in subunit fabrication. Herein, we demonstrated a facile method to prepare uniform nanolaser arrays based on a transverse lateral Fabry–Pérot (FP) microresonator built within single-crystalline organic microribbons of 1,4-bis((E)-2,4-dimethylstyryl)-2,5-dimethylbenzene (6M-DSB). Theoretically, spectroscopic and crystallographic results together reveal that short-axis brickwork-packing and long-axis uniaxial-alignment of 6M-DSB molecules result in a mixed Hj-type aggregation within microribbons. On the one hand, such a kind of Hj-type aggregation exhibits enhanced radiative decay and therefore 100% photoluminescence quantum yield for minimizing the singlet–triplet annihilation and reabsorption of laser photons owing to triplet absorption. On the other hand, the uniaxial alignment gives rise to a transverse lateral FP microresonator along the width of 6M-DSB microribbons, rather than a longitudinal microresonator in conventional nanowire lasers. By positioning a microribbon onto a PDMS pad with patterned grooves, only the suspended parts support transverse waveguiding and high quality FP resonances. A proof-of-concept 1 × 4 transverse nanolaser array constructed from the same microribbon was demonstrated with almost identical lasing thresholds, wavelengths and FP resonances, providing coupled lasing subunits for integrated organic photonics.