Self-Phase Modulation in Semiconductor Optical Amplifiers: Impact of Amplified Spontaneous Emission

Author

Baveja, Prashant P. ; Maywar, Drew N. ; Kaplan, Aaron M. ; Agrawal, Govind P.

Author_Institution

Inst. of Opt., Univ. of Rochester, Rochester, NY, USA

Volume

46

Issue

9

fYear

2010

Firstpage

1396

Lastpage

1403

Abstract

This paper presents a detailed theoretical and experimental study of the impact of amplified spontaneous emission (ASE) on self-phase modulation in semiconductor optical amplifiers (SOAs). A theoretical model of pulse propagation in SOAs is developed that includes the ASE power and its effect on gain-saturation and gain-recovery. We study the impact of ASE on the nonlinear phase shift, frequency chirp, spectrum, and shape of amplified picosecond pulses at a range of drive currents. We verify our predictions experimentally by launching gain-switched picosecond pulses with 3-mW peak power into a commercial SOA exhibiting 9-ps gain-recovery time at a current of 500 mA. Understanding the impact of ASE on SOAs is important for applications that employs SOAs for all-optical signal processing and as data-network amplifiers.

Keywords

self-phase modulation; semiconductor optical amplifiers; superradiance; all-optical signal processing; amplified spontaneous emission; current 500 mA; data-network amplifiers; frequency chirp; gain recovery; gain saturation; nonlinear phase; power 3 mW; pulse propagation; self-phase modulation; semiconductor optical amplifiers; Chirp modulation; Frequency; Optical modulation; Optical propagation; Optical pulse shaping; Optical pulses; Pulse amplifiers; Semiconductor optical amplifiers; Shape; Spontaneous emission; Amplified spontaneous emission (ASE); gain recovery; optical signal processing; self-phase modulation (SPM); semiconductor optical amplifier (SOA); spectral broadening;

fLanguage

English

Journal_Title

Quantum Electronics, IEEE Journal of

Publisher

ieee

ISSN

0018-9197

Type

jour

DOI

10.1109/JQE.2010.2048743

Filename

5518533