Modes of structurally chiral lasers

Abstract

We employ coupled wave theory to enumerate the lasing modes of structurally chiral lasers. The elliptical modes are shown to be fundamentally distinct from those of a scalar distributed feedback laser. High threshold modes are shown to lase with the opposite chirality as the active medium, in contrast to their low-threshold counterparts that lase with the same chirality as the active medium. The lasing mode structure suggests the intriguing possibility of dynamically changing the polarization handedness of a chiral laser, as well as the possibility of lasing within the forbidden band-gap region. These observations arise from the fundamental interplay between the distributed chirality-preserving reflections within the active medium and the localized chirality-reversing reflections at the medium's boundaries.