Wide-uniform triple Brillouin frequency spacing multi-wavelength fiber laser assisted by a distributed Raman...

Area of Science:

• Optics and Photonics
• Fiber Laser Technology
• Nonlinear Optics

Background:

• Multi-wavelength fiber lasers are crucial for high-capacity optical communication and advanced sensing.
• Existing sources often face limitations in channel count, spectral flatness, or stability.
• Hybrid gain mechanisms offer potential for improved laser performance.

Purpose of the Study:

• To demonstrate a wide-uniform and hybrid multi-wavelength fiber laser source.
• To achieve a high channel count with triple Brillouin-shift wavelength spacing.
• To evaluate the laser's performance for practical applications.

Main Methods:

• Utilizing a hybrid gain approach combining erbium-ytterbium-doped fiber and distributed Raman amplifiers.
• Optimizing Brillouin pump wavelength, erbium-ytterbium-doped fiber amplifier, and Raman pump power.
• Characterizing spectral flatness, channel count, bandwidth, optical signal-to-noise ratio, and power stability.

Main Results:

• Generated approximately 164 Stokes lines within a 10 dB spectral flatness.
• Achieved a 40 nm bandwidth with an average optical signal-to-noise ratio of 36 dB.
• Demonstrated outstanding total power stability with only 0.74 dB fluctuation over 45 minutes.
• Realized a 36 nm tuning range starting from 1532 nm.

Conclusions:

• The developed hybrid multi-wavelength fiber laser offers a high channel count and excellent stability.
• Its performance characteristics make it highly practical for optical communication systems and sensing.
• The hybrid gain design effectively overcomes limitations of previous fiber laser sources.