The use of laser diodes and light emitting diodes has grown very rapidly because they are compact, low cost and are very efficient light sources. Their use will definitely increase. At present they are used in CD and DVD storage, data transmission, display backs lighting, laser printing and general lighting.
Sharp is a leading manufacturer of optoelectronic components and research at SLE supports this business. Research has been carried out into red laser diodes based on AlGaInP for DVD applications, investigating areas such as carrier leakage, catastrophic optical damage and p-type doping.
Different applications require different specifications of light (wavelength, power, beam divergence, modulation speed etc.) and AOD’s activities have significantly expanded to cover a broad range of optoelectronic devices such as edge emitting lasers, VCSELs and LEDs, at infra-red, visible and ultraviolet wavelengths. Further details of our current research projects can be found in the following pages.
