Analysis and design of vertical cavity binary-phase modulators

The Fabry-Perot equation used to model asymmetric Fabry-Perot cavity reflection mode modulators can be considered as a bilinear transformation between the amplitude reflectivity of the modulator and the optical parameters of the cavity. Conformal mapping of this transformation into a suitable plane is used to visualise the operation of such a device working as a binary-phase modulator and to evaluate the tolerance of points of operation towards changes in the physical or operational parameters. Operation away from cavity resonance is shown to be less sensitive to parameter variations than conventional on-resonance operation