EAGER: US-Ireland Femtojoule-per-bit Communications with Nanopillar Lasers on Si

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Objective: This proposal brings together an international US-Ireland team of scientists at University of California Los Angeles (UCLA), the Cork Institute of Technology (CIT), and Queen's University Belfast (QUB) to explore a bottom-up approach to electrically-driven photonic crystal lasers (PCLs) using III-V nano-pillars (NP) grown on Si. This proposal presents a unique set of capabilities to remove deficiencies in NP characterization, making it possible to develop NP lasers to their potential. Intellectual merit: The NP-PCLs have been engineered to surpass the necessary 10 fJ/bit requirement for inter-chip communication by implementing a high-Q, small current aperture cavity with greater than 90% waveguide coupling efficiency. With this international collaboration a rapid development process is possible, where NP growth and device fabrication is performed at UCLA, pump-probe spectroscopy and emission dynamics is performed at TNI, and atom probe tomography and scanning Raman spectroscopy at QUB. The combined effort of the groups will allow researchers to quickly characterize material quality and gain, and evaluate device designs.Broader impacts: The cooperative interaction between the US and Ireland allows for a comprehensive project going much further than would be possible for any individual partner. The participating groups will exchange best practices in areas involving interdisciplinary research, student involvement in research, and community participation. These themes are supported by several efforts to incorporate the findings into nano-materials curricula, train graduate, undergraduate and high school students, and form a concerted effort aimed at increasing minority student participation both in the US and Ireland.