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Characterization of the noise in continuously operating mode-locked lasers
Abstract
An experimental and theoretical investigation of the fluctuations of the pulses from continuous-wave mode-locked lasers is presented. It is shown that these fluctuations can be detected and quantitatively characterized from measurements of the power spectrum of the light intensity. Such power spectra can be measured with great accuracy by shining the laser output on a suitable photodetector and by processing the detector signal with the use of an electronic spectrum analyzer. Different types of noise such as fluctuations of the pulse energy, pulse repetition time, and pulse duration, can be readily recognized from their characteristic spectral signature. Experimental results of noise measurements are presented for a synchronously mode-locked dye laser pumped by an acousto-optically mode-locked argon ion laser, and also for a colliding pulse passively mode-locked dye laser.
... To determine the timing jitter in the attosecond range of these low-phase noise femtosecond sources we implemented the balanced optical cross-correlator (BOC) method [56]. This technique overcomes the restrictions of radio frequency approaches measuring the timing noise [57], and it enables a high-resolution, drift-free, and temperature-independent observation of jitter between two optical pulses with attosecond resolution while staying unresponsive to laser amplitude noise [8,58,59], which makes BOC auspicious compared to all-electronic techniques. ...
The significance of timing jitter stems from its pivotal role in enhancing the precision of applications like spectroscopy and frequency metrology. In this study, we introduce a comprehensive procedure for achieving low timing jitter values in mode-locked fiber laser systems, highlighting dispersion, intracavity pulse energy, pulse length, and spectral bandwidth as key parameters. Notably, we unveil the influence of fiber amplifier pump power on jitter, a factor neglected in established theories and recent experiments. Applying this procedure to a 200-MHz all-polarization-maintaining (PM) erbium-doped (Er:) nonlinear amplifying loop mirror (NALM) fiber laser system, we demonstrate an exceptionally low timing jitter of 14.25 attoseconds, measured using the balanced optical cross-correlation (BOC) technique and integrated from 10 kHz to 4 MHz. The implementation of our novel method offers the opportunity to improve jitter results in various fiber laser systems and increase the accuracy of fiber laser applications.
... With the rapid development of ultrahigh-speed optical telecommunication and signal processing systems nowadays, there has been great demand for measuring and analyzing ultrafast signals with their spectrum diagnostics, especially in the fields of optical signal impairment monitoring in optical communication systems [1][2][3], full characterization of ultrafast optical pulse sources [4,5], microwave photonics [6,7], etc. The radio-frequency (RF) spectrum of an optical signal is the power spectrum of its temporal intensity, i.e., the power spectral density of its autocorrelation. ...
All-optical radio-frequency spectrum analyzers (AORFSAs) with ultrabroad bandwidth break the electronic bottleneck and provide an efficient frequency analysis means for ultrafast optical signals in communications, signal generation and processing systems. Here, we propose and experimentally demonstrate an AORFSA built on the cross-phase modulation effect in a 50 cm long CMOS-compatible photonic slot-waveguide. The waveguide has a 100 nm thick thin-film core of fused silica that is sandwiched by two 750 nm thick cladding layers of high-index doped silica, which shows optimized dispersion and comparable nonlinear characteristics. The measured 3 dB bandwidth of the proposed slot-waveguide-based AORFSA has a three-fold increase over the conventional channel waveguide having the same dimension and length. The sensitivity and wavelength- and polarization-dependence properties are investigated, confirming the proposed waveguide as a versatile platform for frequency analysis of ultrafast optical signals, such as Kerr microcombs with hundreds of GHz or even THz mode spacing.
... --200 mW--300 mW --400 mW --500mW--600mW -120 The RIN spectrum is characterized using the standard measurement method [17]. The optical power is regulated by an attenuator to ensure an appropriate optical power on PD2, which is a switchable gain photodetector (Thorlabs PDA20CS2). ...
We show that an optimum mode-locking state with low relative intensity noise (RIN) can be identified by continuous broadening of an optical spectrum in a stretched-pulse fiber laser based on nonlinear polarization rotation (NPR). Under the premise of keeping the overall spectral shape unchanged, either gradually increasing the pump power or unidirectionally adjusting the polarization controller (PC) can effectively reduce RIN as the optical spectral bandwidth broadens. The optimized intensity noise performance of the laser can be attributed to the increased pulse energy and reduced intra-cavity net dispersion. Moreover, the integrated RIN will further decrease as the maximum 3-dB bandwidth extends. In our experiment, the detected minimum integrated rms RIN is below 0.003% (from 100 Hz to 100 kHz). Our experimental results find that the absolute spectral width is not a necessary key condition for obtaining low RIN mode-locked laser, whereas it may help understand and design versatile low-noise ultrafast laser sources.
This work demonstrates an actively driven ultra‐low phase noise mode‐locked laser built with all polarization‐maintaining components. The output of the laser is an optical pulse train at 4‐GHz repetition rate and 1.63‐ps pulse width. The absolute phase noise and timing jitter of the photo detected signal is measured and found to be –140 dBc/Hz at 10‐kHz offset frequency and 10.21 fs (integrated from 100 Hz to 10 MHz).
Electrical signals derived from optical sources have achieved record‐low levels of phase noise, and have demonstrated the highest frequency stability yet achieved in the microwave domain. Attaining such ultrastable phase and frequency performance requires high‐fidelity optical‐to‐electrical conversion, typically performed via a high‐speed photodiode. This paper reviews characteristics of the direct photodetection of optical pulses for the intent of generating high power, low phase noise microwave signals from optical sources. The two most popular types of photodiode detectors used for low noise microwave generation are discussed in terms of electrical pulse characteristics, achievable microwave power, and photodetector nonlinearities. Noise sources inherent to photodetection, such as shot noise, flicker noise, and photocarrier scattering are reviewed, and their impact on microwave phase fidelity is discussed. General guidelines for attaining the lowest noise possible from photodetection that balances power saturation, optical amplification, and amplitude‐to‐phase conversion are also presented.
We present detailed experimental data on random fluctuations of the pulse properties of a cw rhodamine 6G dye laser synchronously pumped by an acousto-optically mode-locked argon ion laser. It is shown that quantitative information about the fluctuations of the energy, the pulse repetition time and the duration of the pulses can be obtained from the power spectrum of the laser intensity which is measured with the use of an electronic spectrum analyser. This method is capable of revealing small, subpicosecond temporal pulse jitter. We show that the dye laser pulses exhibit an absolute r.m.s. jitter of 20 ps which is induced by the pump laser. The relative jitter in a dual system can be less than 1 ps because well defined correlations of the output fluctuations exist when two lasers are pumped by a common source.
Pulses in the range of 85-350 fs generated by a cw pumped, passively mode-locked dye ring laser where the counter-propagating pulses from a transient grating in the thin absorber have been found to have a down-chirp. This down-chirp corresponds to a wavelength sweep during the pulse duration of about 1 nm.
It is shown that there is a well-defined relation between the intra-cavity power density and the temporal structure of ultrashort light pulses generated by a synchronously pumped cw dye laser. To obtain pulses of good quality with high output power the beam cross-section in the lasing medium must be large, because the best performance is achieved at low power density.
A system providing strong, stable acousto-optic loss modulation for active mode-locking of cw lasers is described. We show that the noise of a mode-locked argon laser is drastically reduced by strong modulation. The effect of pump noise on a synchronously pumped dye laser is demonstrated.
We report a novel passive mode‐locking technique in which two synchronized counterpropagating pulses interact in a thin, saturable absorber to produce a short pulse. Continuous stable trains of pulses shorter than 0.1 psec are obtained using a ring laser configuration.
Second harmonic cross correlation functions of a pulse with its near neighbor have been studied in a synchronously pumped cw dye laser. Measurements were made both as a function of dye laser cavity length mismatch and the number of cavity round trips separating the correlated pulses. The pulse envelope is found to have a characteristic interpulse frequency determined by the pump laser, whereas the pulse substructure has a characteristic frequency determined by the dye laser cavity length. The cross correlation measurements allow experimental determination of the dye laser length corresponding to exact synchrony. In contrast to theoretical predictions the length of exact synchrony corresponds to optimum pulse shape and duration. Our results are discussed in terms of a simple model which leads to pulse duration estimates as much as twice those obtained by conventional analysis of autocorrelation traces.
Measurements performed on the output of a mode-locked ring laser show the pulses to be chirped. The down-frequency modulation is evidenced by experiments of pulse compression in glass, for various concentrations of saturable absorbers.
With the combination of precise autocorrelation and spectral measurements we have established the influence of pulse substructure on the determination of pulse envelope duration of a synchronously pumped dye laser within the noise burst model of Pike and Hersher. Our results make a single sided exponential pulse shape unlikely and we present evidence supporting pulses having Gaussian or skewed Gaussian temporal profiles.
Ultrashort-Light Pulses
- E G See
Doctoral dissertation
- J Kluge