Studies of the transition between amplified spontaneous emission and optical lasing in ultrahigh-Q polymeric micro-pedestals

In this work, we demonstrate the properties of Rhodamine B-doped polymeric cylindrical microlasers to perform either as gain amplification devices through amplified spontaneous emission (ASE) or as optical lasing gain devices. A study based on different %wt concentrations of microcavity families with distinct geometrical features demonstrates the characteristic dependence on either gain amplification phenomena. Principal component analysis (PCA) discriminates the relationship between the main ASE and lasing properties and the geometrical aspects of the cavity families. ASE and optical lasing thresholds were found, respectively, as low as 0.2 μJcm−2 and 0.1 μJcm−2 passing the best-reported microlaser performances in literature for cylindrical cavities, even in comparison with those based on 2D patterns. Moreover, our microlasers showed ultrahigh Q-factor of ∼3 × 106, and for the first time, to the best of our knowledge, a visible emission comb constituted by above a hundred peaks at 40 μJcm−2 with a registered free spectral range (FSR) of 0.25 nm corroborated through the whispery gallery mode (WGM) theory.