Figure-8 optical fiber pulse laser using a dispersion imbalanced nonlinear optical loop mirror

A figure-8 optical fiber pulse laser using a dispersion imbalanced nonlinear optical fiber loop mirror (DI-NOLM) comprising;

• a linear part of the figure-8 optical fiber laser composed of a pump laser diode (LD), a wavelength division multiplexing (WDM) coupler, an erbium doped fiber (EDF), an optical isolator, a band pass filter (BPF), an output coupler, a single mode fiber (SMF) and a polarization controller (PC);
• a nonlinear loop part, DI-NOLM, composed of a dispersion compensated fiber (DCF), a dispersion shifted fiber (DSF), and a PC;
• and
• an optical coupler combining the linear loop part and the nonlinear loop part;
• and wherein;
• the optical pulses are divided into two at the optical coupler;
• one of them propagates the nonlinear loop clockwise;
• the other propagates the loop counterclockwise;
• the clockwise pulses become narrower at the DCF, and then pass the DSF;
• the counterclockwise pluses pass the DSF first, and then, become narrower at the SMF;
• and
• the self-switched optical pulses are produced.