A buried crescent InGaAsP-InP laser with two active layers was fabricated to study the temperature behavior of the double-carrier-confinement structure. An anomalously high characteristic temperature T0 was measured, and optical switching behavior was observed. A mode analysis and numerical calculation using a rate equation approach explained qualitatively very well the experimental results. It was revealed that both the Auger recombination in this special double-active-layer configuration and the temperature-dependent leakage current, which leads to uniform carrier distribution in both active regions, are essential to increase T0
