Massively parallel coherent laser ranging using a soliton microcomb

Coherent ranging, also known as frequency-modulated continuous-wave (FMCW) laser-based light detection and ranging (lidar)¹ is used for long-range three-dimensional distance and velocimetry in autonomous driving^2,3. FMCW lidar maps distance to frequency^4,5 using frequency-chirped waveforms and simultaneously measures the Doppler shift of the reflected laser light, similar to sonar or radar^6,7 and coherent detection prevents interference from sunlight and other lidar systems. However, coherent ranging has a lower acquisition speed and requires precisely chirped⁸ and highly coherent⁵ laser sources, hindering widespread use of the lidar system and impeding parallelization, compared to modern time-of-flight ranging systems that use arrays of individual lasers. Here we demonstrate a massively parallel coherent lidar scheme using an ultra-low-loss photonic chip-based soliton microcomb⁹. By fast chirping of the pump laser in the soliton existence range¹⁰ of a microcomb with amplitudes of up to several gigahertz and a sweep rate of up to ten megahertz, a rapid frequency change occurs in the underlying carrier waveform of the soliton pulse stream, but the pulse-to-pulse repetition rate of the soliton pulse stream is retained. As a result, the chirp from a single narrow-linewidth pump laser is transferred to all spectral comb teeth of the soliton at once, thus enabling parallelism in the FMCW lidar. Using this approach we generate 30 distinct channels, demonstrating both parallel distance and velocity measurements at an equivalent rate of three megapixels per second, with the potential to improve sampling rates beyond 150 megapixels per second and to increase the image refresh rate of the FMCW lidar by up to two orders of magnitude without deterioration of eye safety. This approach, when combined with photonic phase arrays¹¹ based on nanophotonic gratings¹², provides a technological basis for compact, massively parallel and ultrahigh-frame-rate coherent lidar systems.