Dual Sagnac loop mirror SOA-based widely tunable dual-output port fiber laser

Abstract

A widely tunable (30 nm) fiber laser based on a double Sagnac loop mirror configuration is proposed and demonstrated. A semiconductor optical amplifier (SOA) placed between the two loop mirrors acts as the gain medium. The fiber laser has two output ports with adjustable optical power outputs. Wavelength tunability is obtained through the use of a thin film tunable filter, while optical power adjustability is accomplished by proper adjustment of each of the loop mirror reflectivity via a polarization controller. A total output power of + 9 dBm is measured and the potential for higher output powers is discussed. Optical power stability of better than +/- 0.15 dB is measured for 6 hours.

Tunable Fibre Lasers Based on Optical Amplifiers and an Opto-VLSI Processor

“…Up to 29 stable lasing lines with 0.4 nm spacing and 14 lasing wavelengths with 0.8 nm spacing in 3 dB bandwidth were obtained. Wavelength tunability can also be obtained through the use of a thin film tunable filter (Ummy et al, 2009). A widely tunable (30 nm) fiber laser based on two Sagnac loop mirrors and a tunable thin film filter has been demonstrated, where optical power adjustability is accomplished by proper adjustment of each of the loop mirror reflectivity via a polarization controller.…”

“…Many gain media are suitable for single-wavelength lasing in a fiber cavity, including erbium-doped fiber amplifiers (EDFA) (Antoine Bellemare, 2003), semiconductor optical amplifiers (SOA) (Ummy et al, 2009), and hybrid gain media (Yeh&Chi, 2005). SOA-based fiber ring lasers have limited optical signal-to-noise ratio (OSNR), while EDFAs are ideal for single-wavelength tunable fiber ring lasers.…”

A Novel Technique for Designing High Power Semiconductor Optical Amplifier (SOA)-Based Tunable Fiber Compound-Ring Lasers Using Low Power Optical Components

“…All-single-mode fiber-based Sagnac loop mirrors have been widely used in temperature [18], strain [19], and pressure [20] high sensitivity sensors as well as in wavelength optical switches [21]. Moreover, SLMs with adjustable reflectivity have been used to form Fabry-Perot linear resonators [22][23][24][25] where the amount of the output optical power from the resonators depends on the reflectivity of the SLMs [26,27]. In this work, two SLMs were used to control the amount of optical power delivered from two output ports of the proposed fiber compound-ring laser.…”

Tunable multi-wavelength SOA based linear cavity fiber laser source for optical communications applications

“…These include linear cavities [7], ring cavities [8][9], compound fiber ring cavities [10], and Fox-Smith cavities [11]. The wavelength selectivity can be achieved by inserting various wavelength selective elements in the cavity, such as an Opto-VLSI processor [12], a FabryPerot etalon [13], fiber comb filters [14] or an interferometer filter [15].…”