Abstract
Mirror coating is applied to laser facets to improve properties of edge emitting laser diodes. In this experiment, InGaAsP/GaAs high power laser diodes were studied with respect to different degrees of anti-reflective coating. Sputterred $Al_{2}$O$_{3}$ was used as the coating material and the HR coating was kept constant at 90%. Threshold current density, differential quantum efficiency, emission wavelength and the operating current at 500mW were measured for a range of AR coating and compared with theoretically calculated values; that showed good agreements. Precise wavelength control is important for laser diodes for solid state pumping because of small absorption bandwidth. In addition, since these lasers operate under CW condition, a lowest possible operating current for a given power is desired in order to minimize the heat produced. From the results of this experiment, we were able to obtain a optimum range of AR coatings for minimum operating current. The wavelength can be varied up to 4nm within this range.