Patent ID: 7012942

Claim:
A vertical cavity laser array device, comprising: a) a substrate; b) a bottom dielectric stack reflective to light over a predetermined range of wavelengths and being disposed over the substrate; c) an active region for producing laser light; d) a top dielectric stack spaced from the bottom dielectric stack and reflective to light over a predetermined range of wavelengths; e) the active region includes one or more periodic gain region(s) and spacer layers disposed on either side of the periodic gain region(s) and arranged so that the periodic gain region(s) is aligned with the antinodes of the device's standing wave electromagnetic field; f) means for modulating the properties of the periodic gain region(s) at spaced locations so as to provide an array of spaced laser pixels which have higher net gain than the interpixel regions; and g) the spaced laser pixels having the same or different sizes and the spacings between pixels having the same or different lengths to cause the output of the vertical cavity laser array device to produce single or multimode laser output.