Equivalence of displacement radiation damage in superluminescent diodes induced by protons and heavy ions

The degradation of optical power for superluminescent diodes is in situ measured under exposures of protons with various energies (170 keV, 3 MeV and 5 MeV), and 25 MeV carbon ions for several irradiation fluences. Experimental results show that the optical power of the SLDs decreases with increasing fluence. The protons with lower energies cause more degradation in the optical power of SLDs than those with higher energies at a given fluence. Compared to the proton irradiation with various energies, the 25 MeV carbon ions induce more severe degradation to the optical power. To characterize the radiation damage of the SLDs, the displacement doses as a function of chip depth in the SLDs are calculated by SRIM code for the protons and carbon ions. Based on the irradiation testing and calculation results, an approach is given to normalize the equivalence of displacement damage induced by various charged particles in SLDs.