Mode selection laser

The invention relates to a semiconductor mode selection laser, particularly to a VCSEL laser (200) having mode selection properties. The mode selection capability of the laser is achieved by configuring one of the reflectors (15,51) in the resonance cavity so that a reflectivity of the reflector (15) varies spatially in one dimension or two dimensions. Accordingly, the reflector (15) with spatially varying reflectivity is part both of the resonance cavity and the mode selection functionality of the laser. A plurality of the lasers configured with different mode selectors, i.e. different spatial reflector variations, may be combined to generate a laser beam containing a plurality of orthogonal modes. The laser beam may be injected into a few- mode optical fiber, e.g. for the purpose of optical communication. The VCSEL may have intra-cavity contacts (31,37) and a Tunnel junction (33) for current confinement into the active layer (34). An air-gap layer (102) may be provided between the upper reflector (15) and the SOI wafer (50) acting as a substrate. The lower reflector may be designed as a high-contrast grating (51) by etching.