We report the first experimental observation of an energy oscillation between two coupled ultra-high Q whispering gallery modes in the time domain. Two counter-propagating whispering gallery modes in a silica toroid microcavity were employed for this purpose. The combination of a large coupling coefficient between the two modes and an ultra-high Q factor, which creates a large Γ value of > 10, results in a clear energy oscillation. Our measurement is based on a drop-port measurement technique, which enables us to observe the light energy in the two modes directly. The oscillation period measured in the time domain precisely matched that inferred from mode splitting in the frequency domain, and the measured results showed excellent agreement with results calculated with the developed numerical model.

We generate broad bandwidth visible light ranging from 498 to 611 nm via third-harmonic generation in a silica toroid microcavity. The silica toroid microcavity is fed with a continuous-wave input at a telecom wavelength, where third-harmonic generation follows the generation of an infrared Kerr comb via cascaded four-wave-mixing and stimulated Raman scattering effects. Thanks to these cascaded effects (four-wave mixing, stimulated Raman scattering, and third-harmonic generation) in an ultrahigh-Q microcavity, a broad bandwidth visible light is obtained. The visible light couples with the whispering gallery mode of the cavity by demonstrating the evanescent coupling of the generated visible light with a tapered fiber based on an add-drop configuration.

A numerical and experimental study of Kerr frequency comb generation in a silica toroid microcavity is presented. We use a generalized mean-field Lugiato–Lefever equation and solve it with the split-step Fourier method. We observe that a stable mode-locked regime can be accessed when we reduce the input power after strong pumping due to the bistable nature of the nonlinear cavity system used. The experimental results agree well with the results of the numerical analysis, where we obtain a low-noise Kerr comb spectrum by gradually reducing the pumping input after strong pumping. This finding complements the results obtained by a previous wavelength scanning method and clarifies the procedure for achieving mode-locked states in such high-Q microcavity systems.

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