High-efficiency integrated laser on erbium-doped lithium niobate-on-insulator
Abstract
Lithium niobate on insulator (LNOI) combines the outstanding optical properties of lithium niobate (LN) with strong optical confinement, scalable fabrication and high-density integration, making it a leading platform for integrated photonic chips. Recent advances in LNOI photonics have mainly centred on passive and electro-optic components, including couplers, waveguides, microcavities and modulators, whereas efficient on-chip laser sources remain insufficiently developed, limiting the realization of fully integrated LN photonic systems. Because LN is an indirect-bandgap material, lasing on LNOI generally relies on photoluminescence from rare-earth-ion doping, yet the conversion efficiency of doped LNOI lasers has remained low. By comparing LNOI microcavity lasers with fibre lasers and waveguide amplifiers, we identify the limited number of rare-earth ions participating in stimulated emission as a key factor responsible for inefficient pump utilization. Here we demonstrate an integrated Er-doped LNOI laser that combines high-quality, highly Er-doped LN, a large-diameter wide-microring resonator, a low-loss waveguide amplifier and bidirectional pumping. This architecture enables a slope efficiency of 16.91% at 1562 nm, exceeding 10% on the LNOI platform for the first time. Our results provide a route towards high-efficiency LNOI lasers for fully integrated photonic systems.
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BibTeX
@misc{zhang2026highefficiency,
title = {{High-efficiency integrated laser on erbium-doped lithium niobate-on-insulator}},
author = {Chunyu Zhang and Yuqi Zhang and Yiyang Zou and Xiaomin Wang and Binwen Niu and Cangsu Yuan and Tongxin Xue and Chunlin Zhu and Hongde Liu and Dahuai Zheng and Shiguo Liu and Fang Bo and Yongfa Kong and Jingjun Xu},
howpublished = {arXiv},
year = {2026},
month = sep,
doi = {10.48550/arxiv.2609.15304},
eprint = {2609.15304},
archivePrefix = {arXiv},
url = {https://arxiv.org/abs/2609.15304},
}
RIS
TY - UNPB
TI - High-efficiency integrated laser on erbium-doped lithium niobate-on-insulator
AU - Chunyu Zhang
AU - Yuqi Zhang
AU - Yiyang Zou
AU - Xiaomin Wang
AU - Binwen Niu
AU - Cangsu Yuan
AU - Tongxin Xue
AU - Chunlin Zhu
AU - Hongde Liu
AU - Dahuai Zheng
AU - Shiguo Liu
AU - Fang Bo
AU - Yongfa Kong
AU - Jingjun Xu
PY - 2026
DA - 2026/09/14
PB - arXiv
DO - 10.48550/arxiv.2609.15304
UR - https://arxiv.org/abs/2609.15304
AB - Lithium niobate on insulator (LNOI) combines the outstanding optical properties of lithium niobate (LN) with strong optical confinement, scalable fabrication and high-density integration, making it a leading platform for integrated photonic chips. Recent advances in LNOI photonics have mainly centred on passive and electro-optic components, including couplers, waveguides, microcavities and modulators, whereas efficient on-chip laser sources remain insufficiently developed, limiting the realization of fully integrated LN photonic systems. Because LN is an indirect-bandgap material, lasing on LNOI generally relies on photoluminescence from rare-earth-ion doping, yet the conversion efficiency of doped LNOI lasers has remained low. By comparing LNOI microcavity lasers with fibre lasers and waveguide amplifiers, we identify the limited number of rare-earth ions participating in stimulated emission as a key factor responsible for inefficient pump utilization. Here we demonstrate an integrated Er-doped LNOI laser that combines high-quality, highly Er-doped LN, a large-diameter wide-microring resonator, a low-loss waveguide amplifier and bidirectional pumping. This architecture enables a slope efficiency of 16.91% at 1562 nm, exceeding 10% on the LNOI platform for the first time. Our results provide a route towards high-efficiency LNOI lasers for fully integrated photonic systems.
ER -