Patent · US Expired

Tunable fiber optic parametric oscillator

US6501591B1 · kind B1 · utility

21Cited by
2References
41Claims
0Family size

Assignee

Inventors

Key dates

Filing dateOct 29, 1999
Grant dateDec 31, 2002
Priority date
Expiry dateOct 29, 2019

Classification

  • Technology area (CPC G)Physics
  • CPC primaryG02F1/3536
  • WIPO fieldOptics
  • WIPO sectorInstruments

Abstract

A tunable fiber optic parametric oscillator includes a nonlinear optical loop mirror or fiber Sagnac interferometer NFSI with a dispersion shifted fiber portion. The oscillator is synchronously pumped to amplify a signal wave, while reflecting the depleted pump pulse back towards the pump. The amplified signal wave and simultaneously generated idler waves are directed to a spectral filter. The spectral filter may be a diffraction grating, a Faraday mirror or other optical filter that is tunable to change the signal wavelength that is reflected back to the NFSI. The fiber optic parametric oscillator is tunable over substantially the entire gain bandwidth and is insensitive to the polarization of the pump pulses. The fiber optic parametric oscillator may be used as a tunable source of short pulses for high speed optical communication systems. The fiber optic parametric oscillator may also be used for synchronization and clock recovery.

Source: USPTO / EPO open patent data. Objective bibliographic and citation counts.