High-power tunable laser on silicon photonics platform
AssigneeInphi Corporation
InventorsXiaoguang HE, Radhakrishnan L. NAGARAJAN
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Abstract
A high-power tunable laser includes a gain medium configured to emit light and amplify light intensity. The gain medium has a length equal to or greater than 1.5 mm between a backend and a frontend configured to be an output port for outputting light with amplified intensity. The high-power tunable laser further includes a wavelength tuner optically coupled to the backend to receive light from the gain medium and configured to tune wavelength for the light and have a high-reflectivity reflector to reflect the light with a tuned wavelength back to the gain medium.
Claims20
A high-power tunable laser for outputting wavelength tuned laser light, comprising:
- a gain medium configured to receive light, amplify a light intensity of light in the gain medium and emit light having an amplified light intensity, the gain medium configured as a reflective semiconductor optical amplifier (RSOA) having a length extending between a backend and a frontend, the front-end being configured as an output port for outputting light having amplified light intensity relative to received light that is received at the backend;
- and
- a wavelength tuner optically coupled to the backend of the gain medium, the wavelength tuner configured to receive light from the gain medium and tune a wavelength of light from the gain medium, the wavelength tuner having a high-reflectivity reflector configured to reflect the light with a tuned wavelength back to the gain medium the length of the gain medium being dimensioned to amplify light power of light received from the wavelength tuner to output wavelength tune laser light.
A high-power tunable laser disposed on a silicon photonics platform comprising:
- a silicon substrate;
- a semiconductor gain chip flip-mounted on the silicon substrate, the semiconductor gain chip comprising a linear gain medium having a partially reflective frontend and a backend exhibiting anti-reflective characteristics, the gain medium being configured to receive light and amplify light intensity of light in the gain medium before outputting the light having amplified intensity, relative to the light received at the backend, through the frontend;
- and
- a resonant ring tuner including a pair of rings with respectively different diameters and a reflector, each ring being comprised of a wire waveguide disposed in the silicon substrate, the resonant ring tuner being configured to (i) optically couple to the backend of the gain medium, the resonant ring tuner having anti-reflective characteristics enabling it to receive light from the linear gain medium and (ii) tune a wavelength of the light before reflecting wavelength tuned light by the reflector back to the linear gain medium.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.