fdtd Semiconductor Microlaser Simulator v. 2.0

This software simulates the transient optical response of a system of in-plane semiconductor lasers/waveguides of almost arbitrary 2D complexity using the effective index approximation. Gain is calculated by solving a 3D transport equation from an arbitrary contact geometry and epi structure to get an input current density to the active region, followed by a diffusion equation for carriers in that layer. The gain is saturable and frequency dependent so that output powers and frequency spectrum/longitudinal modes are predicted. Solution is by the finite-difference time-domain method on a 2D triangular grid, so that propagation in any direction along the epi plan is allowed, and arbitrary laser/waveguide shapes can be modeled, including rings. Runtime considerations, however, limit the practical solution region to approximately 500 microns**2 so that the applicability of this code is primarily limited to micro-resonators. Modeling of standard-edge-emitting semiconductor lasers is better accomplished using algorithms based on bi-directional beam propagation.