Single and multiple wavelength laser systems are presented that employ self-injection locked InGaN/GaN green laser diodes in an external cavity configuration with a partially reflective mirror. A stable and simultaneous locking of up to four longitudinal Fabry–Perot modes of the system cavity is demonstrated with appreciable signal-to-noise-ratio of ∼13 dB and average mode linewidth of ∼150 pm. The multi-wavelength spectrum exhibited a flat-top emission with nearly equal power distribution among the modes and an analogous mode spacing of ∼0.5 nm. This first demonstration of multi-wavelength generation source is highly attractive in a multitude of cross-disciplinary field applications besides asserting the prospects of narrow wavelength spaced multiplexed visible light communication. Moreover, an extended two-stage self-injection locked near single wavelength visible laser system is also presented. An ultra-narrow linewidth of ∼34 pm is realized at 525.05 nm locked wavelength from this innovative system, with ∼20 dB side-mode-suppression-ratio; thus signifying a paradigm shift toward semiconductor lasers for near single lasing wavelength generation, which is presently dominated by other kinds of laser technologies.

Group-III-nitride superluminescent diodes (SLDs) are emerging as light sources for white lighting and visible light communications (VLC) owing to their droop-free, low speckle noise and large modulation bandwidth properties. In this study, we discuss the development of GaN-based visible SLDs, and analyze their electro-optical properties by studying the optical power-bandwidth products (PBPs) and injection current densities. The significant progress in blue SLDs and their applications for white light VLC is highlighted. A blue SLD, with an optical power of > 100 mW and large PBP of 536 mW.nm, is utilized to generate white light, resulting in a high CRI of 88.2. In a modulation experiment designed for an SLD-based VLC system, an on-off keying scheme exhibits a 1.2 Gbps data rate, with a bit error rate (BER) of 1.8 × 10-3, which satisfies the forward error correction (FEC) criteria. A high data rate of 3.4 Gbps is achieved using the same SLD transmitter, by applying the 16-QAM discrete multi-tone (DMT) modulation scheme for high-speed white light communication. The results reported here unequivocally point to the significant performance and versatility that GaN-based SLDs could offer for beyond-5G implementation, where white lighting and high spectral efficiency VLC systems can be simultaneously implemented.