Researchers construct world’s most powerful terahertz laser chip

Researchers from the University of Leeds in England have exceeded 1-W output power from a quantum cascade terahertz laser.

The quantum cascade terahertz laser chip designed by the University of Leeds.

Terahertz waves, which lie in the part of the electromagnetic spectrum between infrared and microwaves, can penetrate materials that block visible light and have a wide range of possible uses including chemical analysis, security scanning, medical imaging, and telecommunications.

The chip’s record more than doubles landmarks set by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and a team from Vienna last year. (The Austrian team reported an output of 0.47 W from a single laser facet.)

Why do we care about terahertz lasers?

“Although it is possible to build large instruments that generate powerful beams of terahertz radiation, these instruments are only useful for a limited set of applications. We need terahertz lasers that not only offer high power but are also portable and low cost,” said Edmund Linfield, Professor of Terahertz Electronics at the Leeds School of Electronic and Electrical Engineering.

Potential applications include monitoring pharmaceutical products, the remote sensing of chemical signatures of explosives in unopened envelopes, and the non-invasive detection of cancers in the human body so researchers face the challenge of making the lasers powerful and compact enough to be useful.

The Leeds team has developed its quantum cascade terahertz lasers that are only a few square millimeters in size.

For more information, visit the University of Leeds website.