Optical vector analysis (OVA) capable of achieving magnitude and phase responses is essential for the fabrication and application of emerging optical devices. Conventional OVA often has to make compromises among resolution, dynamic range, and bandwidth. Here we show an original method to meet the measurement requirements for ultra-wide bandwidth, ultra-high resolution, and ultra-large dynamic range simultaneously, based on an asymmetric optical probe signal generator (ASG) and receiver (ASR). The ASG and ASR remove the measurement errors introduced by the modulation nonlinearity and enable an ultra-large dynamic range. Thanks to the wavelength-independence of the ASG and ASR, the measurement range can increase by 2 N times by applying an N-tone optical frequency comb without complicated operation. In an experiment, OVA with a resolution of 334 Hz (2.67 attometer in the 1550-nm band), a dynamic range of > 90 dB and a measurement range of 1.075 THz is demonstrated.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.