50 fs soliton compression of optical clock pulse recovered from NRZ data injected SOAFL

• Published in: Optics express 2010-04, Vol.18 (9), p.9525-9530
• Main Authors: Lin, Gong-Ru, Lin, Yu-Chan, Lin, Kuen-Cherng, Lee, Wei-Yu, Wu, Chung-Lun
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• ISSN: 1094-4087; 1094-4087
• DOI: 10.1364/OE.18.009525

Mode-locking of semiconductor optical amplifier fiber laser (SOAFL) with 50 fs pulses by extracting the clock of an optical non-return-to-zero (NRZ) data injection is demonstrated. The efficiency of mode-locking in the SOAFL is improved by increasing the seeding power of the large-duty-cycle NRZ data from 3 to 8 dBm into the SOA driven at biased current of 350 mA. After linear dispersion compensation, the mode-locked SOAFL pulsewidth can be further shortened from 20 to 3 ps by increasing the DCF length up to 110 m. By using a booster the EDFA to enlarge the average power of mode-locked SOAFL pulse to 1.3 W, the shortest soliton pulse is occurred after propagating through a 12-m-long SMF. The amplified SOAFL pulse can be compressed to 50 fs after nonlinear compression with its spectral linewidth broadening to 64 nm. Nearly transform-limited time-bandwidth product of 0.436 and the maximum pulse compressing ratio of 400 are reported to date.