  Interest in photonic crystal nanocavities is fueled by advances in device
performance, particularly in the development of low-threshold laser sources.
Effective electrical control of high performance photonic crystal lasers has
thus far remained elusive due to the complexities associated with current
injection into cavities. A fabrication procedure for electrically pumping
photonic crystal membrane devices using a lateral p-i-n junction has been
developed and is described in this work. We have demonstrated electrically
pumped lasing in our junctions with a threshold of 181 nA at 50K - the lowest
threshold ever demonstrated in an electrically pumped laser. At room
temperature we find that our devices behave as single-mode light-emitting
diodes (LEDs), which when directly modulated, have an ultrafast electrical
response up to 10 GHz corresponding to less than 1 fJ/bit energy operation -
the lowest for any optical transmitter. In addition, we have demonstrated
electrical pumping of photonic crystal nanobeam LEDs, and have built fiber
taper coupled electro-optic modulators. Fiber-coupled photodetectors based on
two-photon absorption are also demonstrated as well as multiply integrated
components that can be independently electrically controlled. The presented
electrical injection platform is a major step forward in providing practical
low power and integrable devices for on-chip photonics.
