In-package temporally modulated reference source for tunable optical filter system

Abstract

A tunable optical filter system 10 has a reference source system 24 that is integrated with the tunable filter 22 on bench 14 and within hermetic package 12. The reference source system 24 is temporally modulated to decrease interference or crosstalk into the scan of the optical signal 64 of interest. Specifically, a system controller 100 energizes the reference source during a reference scan in which the tunable filter 22 is scanned across a spectrum of the optical reference 66. The controller 100, however, lowers, such as simply decreasing or entirely cutting, power to the reference source system 24 during a signal scan, in which the tunable filter 22 is scanned across the optical signal's spectrum. In this way, interference during the signal scan from the reference source system is reduced.

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