All-optical switches based on Mach-Zehnder configuration with improved extinction ratios

Author

Besse, P.A. ; Melchior, H.

Author_Institution

Swiss Federal Inst. of Technol., Lausanne, Switzerland

Volume

9

Issue

1

fYear

1997

Firstpage

55

Lastpage

57

Abstract

We study driving conditions to improve the extinction ratios in 2/spl times/2 and 1/spl times/2 all-optical switches based on semiconductor optical amplifiers in Mach-Zehnder configuration. In 2/spl times/2 switches, the optimization of the relative phases of both arms of the interferometer together with the introduction of an optical push-pull lead to enhanced and symmetrical extinctions. In 1/spl times/2 switches, perfect extinctions can theoretically be obtained by adapting the splitting ratios of the input and output couplers to the saturation behavior of the amplifiers.

Keywords

Mach-Zehnder interferometers; optical switches; Mach-Zehnder interferometer; all-optical switch; coupler splitting ratio; driving characteristics; extinction ratio; optical push-pull; phase optimization; saturation; semiconductor optical amplifier; Arm; Couplers; Extinction coefficients; Extinction ratio; Optical amplifiers; Optical interferometry; Optical saturation; Optical switches; Semiconductor optical amplifiers; Stimulated emission;

fLanguage

English

Journal_Title

Photonics Technology Letters, IEEE

Publisher

ieee

ISSN

1041-1135

Type

jour

DOI

10.1109/68.554487

Filename

554487