Self-referenced characterization of optical frequency combs and arbitrary waveforms using a simple, linear, zero-delay implementation of spectral shearing interferometry

Abstract

We discuss a simple, linear, zero-delay implementation of spectral shearing interferometry for amplitude and phase characterization of optical frequency comb sources and arbitrary waveforms. We demonstrate this technique by characterizing two different high repetition rate (~10 GHz) frequency comb sources, generated respectively by strong external and intracavity phase modulation of a continuous-wave laser. This technique is easy to implement, requiring only an intensity modulator and an optical spectrum analyzer (OSA), and is demonstrated to work at average power levels down to 100nW (10aJ/pulse at 10 GHz). By exploiting the long coherence lengths of these frequency combs and the self-referenced nature of the measurement, we also demonstrate a simple single-ended measurement of dispersion and dispersion slope in long lengths of fiber (>25km).

8 pages, 4 figures, replaced the older version with the published version

References in corpus (3)

• Optical frequency comb generation from a monolithic microresonator
• Single Shot Amplitude and Phase Characterization of Optical Arbitrary Waveforms
• Fast Characterization of Dispersion and Dispersion Slope of Optical Fiber Links using Spectral Interferometry with Frequency Combs

Cited by in corpus (4)

• Generation of very flat optical frequency combs from continuous-wave lasers using cascaded intensity and phase modulators driven by tailored radio frequency waveforms
• Ultrafast electrooptic dual-comb interferometry
• Bandwidth scaling and spectral flatness enhancement of optical frequency combs from phase modulated continuous-wave lasers using cascaded four-wave mixing
• Synthetic photonic lattice for single-shot reconstruction of frequency combs