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US 8,111,722 B1Granted
Low-noise RF oscillation and optical comb generation based on nonlinear optical resonator
AssigneeOEwaves, Inc.
InventorsLutfollah Maleki, Andrey B. Matsko, Anatoliy Savchenkov, Vladimir Ilchenko, David Seidel
Life of this patent
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Abstract
Techniques and devices based on optical resonators made of nonlinear optical materials and nonlinear wave mixing to generate RF or microwave oscillations and optical comb signals.
Claims19
A method for generating an RF or microwave oscillation, comprising:
- coupling a laser beam from a laser into a whispering-gallery-mode resonator formed of a nonlinear optical material with a third order nonlinearity at a power level above a pump threshold power level to cause an optical hyperparametric oscillation based on a nonlinear mixing in the resonator;
- coupling light out of the resonator into a photodetector to produce an RF or microwave signal at an RF or microwave frequency with low noise;
- and
- locking the laser to the resonator to stabilize the RF or microwave signal output by the photodetector,
- wherein:
- the laser is locked to the resonator via injection locking by directing a portion of the light coupled out of the resonator back into the laser.
3 more elements
A method for generating an RF or microwave oscillation, comprising:
- coupling a laser beam from a laser into a whispering-gallery-mode resonator formed of a nonlinear optical material with a third order nonlinearity at a power level above a pump threshold power level to cause an optical hyperparametric oscillation based on a nonlinear mixing in the resonator;
- coupling light out of the resonator into a photodetector to produce an RF or microwave signal at an RF or microwave frequency with low noise;
- locking the laser to the resonator to stabilize the RF or microwave signal output by the photodetector;
- and
- coupling light generated by Rayleigh scattering inside the resonator out of the resonator as a feedback beam into the laser to lock the laser by injection locking.
2 more elements
A method for generating an RF or microwave oscillation, comprising:
- coupling a laser beam from a laser into a whispering-gallery-mode resonator formed of a nonlinear optical material with a third order nonlinearity at a power level above a pump threshold power level to cause an optical hyperparametric oscillation based on a nonlinear mixing in the resonator;
- coupling light out of the resonator into a photodetector to produce an RF or microwave signal at an RF or microwave frequency with low noise;
- locking the laser to the resonator to stabilize the RF or microwave signal output by the photodetector;
- and
- reflecting at least a portion of the light coupled out of the resonator back to the resonator;
- coupling the reflected portion into the resonator in a whispering gallery mode that propagates in a direction opposite to a propagation direction of light that is coupled into the resonator from the laser beam;
- and
- coupling light of the reflected portion coupled into the resonator out of the resonator as a feedback beam along an optical path of the laser beam from the laser in an opposite direction of the laser beam to inject the light into the laser for locking the laser.
5 more elements
A device for generating an RF or microwave oscillation, comprising:
- a whispering-gallery-mode resonator formed of a nonlinear optical material exhibiting a third order nonlinearity;
- a laser to produce a laser beam that interacts with the nonlinear optical material to cause an optical hyperparametric oscillation due to a nonlinear mixing in the resonator;
- a first optical coupler that directly couples to the laser at one end of the first optical coupler to receive the laser beam and directly couples to the resonator to couple the laser beam into the resonator;
- a second optical coupler that directly couples to the resonator to output light out of the resonator;
- a photodetector directly coupled to the second optical coupler to receive the output light and to produce an optical hyperparametric oscillation signal at an RF or microwave frequency with low noise;
- and
- a laser locking mechanism that locks the laser to the resonator,
- wherein:
- the laser locking mechanism is based on injection locking by injecting light coupled out of the resonator into the laser.
6 more elements
A device, comprising:
- an optical resonator formed of a nonlinear optical material exhibiting a third order nonlinearity and structured to circulate light in one or more resonator modes;
- a laser to produce a laser beam that interacts with the nonlinear optical material to cause an optical hyperparametric oscillation due to a nonlinear mixing in the resonator;
- an optical coupler that couples to the resonator to couple the laser beam from the laser along a first optical path into the resonator and couples light inside the resonator out as a resonator output beam along a second optical path;
- an optical reflector in the second optical path to reflect at least a portion of the resonator output beam back to the optical coupler which couples the reflected portion into the resonator in a way that the optical coupler couples light of the reflected portion inside the resonator out as a feedback beam to the laser;
- and
- a mechanism to control a phase of the feedback beam to establish a phase matching for locking the laser to the resonator based on injection locking.
3 more elements
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.