Light-emitting component, light-emitting element array chip, and optical measurement apparatus

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-12476439-B2
Application number	US-202117411337-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	Aug 25, 2021
Priority date	Apr 26, 2021
Publication date	Nov 18, 2025
Grant date	Nov 18, 2025

Abstract

A light-emitting component includes a substrate, plural light-emitting elements that are disposed on the substrate and emit light in a direction intersecting with a surface of the substrate, and a gate electrode that is electrically connected to each of the plural light-emitting elements and performs control so that the plural light-emitting elements are switched ON/OFF together. Plural holes are disposed around each of the plural light-emitting elements.

First claim

What is claimed is:

1 . A light-emitting component comprising:
a substrate;
a plurality of light-emitting elements that are disposed on the substrate and emit light in a direction perpendicular to a surface of the substrate; and
a gate electrode that is electrically connected to each of the plurality of light-emitting elements and performs control so that the plurality of light-emitting elements are switched ON/OFF together,
wherein a plurality of holes are disposed around each of the plurality of light-emitting elements.

2 . The light-emitting component according to claim 1 , wherein the plurality of light-emitting elements have a layer structure including layers forming a thyristor and a light-emitting layer, the light-emitting layer being disposed between layers of the thyristor so as to emit light.

3 . The light-emitting component according to claim 2 , wherein a gate layer forming the layers of the thyristor is continuously provided as a common layer between the plurality of light-emitting elements via the plurality of holes and is also electrically connected to the gate electrode.

4 . The light-emitting component according to claim 2 , wherein a topmost layer forming the layers of the thyristor is continuously provided as a common layer between the plurality of light-emitting elements via the plurality of holes.

5 . The light-emitting component according to claim 2 , wherein the thyristor includes a current confinement layer, the current confinement layer being oxidized via the plurality of holes so as to confine a current flowing through the light-emitting layer.

6 . The light-emitting component according to claim 1 , wherein the plurality of holes are deep enough to reach a position at least until a bottom surface of the gate electrode.

7 . The light-emitting component according to claim 6 , wherein the plurality of holes are deep enough to reach a position at a bottommost layer of layers forming the plurality of light-emitting elements having a thyristor structure.

8 . The light-emitting component according to claim 7 , wherein, in order to form a current confinement layer circularly, the plurality of holes are disposed at predetermined spacings circularly around a light-emitting window, each of the plurality of light-emitting elements emitting light through the light-emitting window, the current confinement layer being oxidized via the plurality of holes so as to confine a current flowing through a light-emitting layer of the plurality of light-emitting elements.

9 . The light-emitting component according to claim 1 , further comprising:
a thyristor disposed on the plurality of light-emitting elements.

10 . The light-emitting component according to claim 9 , wherein the thyristor is disposed on the plurality of light-emitting elements via a tunnel junction layer or a metallic-conductive III-V compound layer.

11 . A light-emitting element array chip comprising:
a light-emitting component array that includes light-emitting components disposed in a row in a main scanning direction, each of the light-emitting components being the light-emitting component according to claim 1 ; and a driver that inputs and outputs a signal for driving the light-emitting components.

12 . An optical measurement apparatus comprising:
the light-emitting component according to claim 1 ; a light receiver that receives light which is emitted from the light-emitting component and is reflected by a subject; and a processor that processes information regarding the light received by the light receiver so as to measure a distance from the light-emitting component to the subject or to measure a configuration of the subject.

Assignees

• Fujifilm Business Innovation Corp

Inventors

• Kondo Takashi
• Murata Michiaki
• Hayakawa Junichiro
• Higuchi Takafumi

Classifications

• G01S7/4863

  Detector arrays, e.g. charge-transfer gates · CPC title

• G01S17/894

  Three-dimensional [3D] imaging with simultaneous measurement of time-of-flight at a two-dimensional [2D] array of receiver pixels, e.g. time-of-flight cameras or flash lidar · CPC title

• H01S5/04256

  characterised by the configuration · CPC title

• G01S7/484

  Transmitters · CPC title

• G01S7/4815

  using multiple transmitters · CPC title