Spectrally stable Er-fiber laser for application in phase-sensitive optical time-domain reflectometry

Author

Choi, Kyoo Nam ; Taylor, Henry F.

Author_Institution

Dept. of Commun. Eng., Incheon City Coll., South Korea

Volume

15

Issue

3

fYear

2003

fDate

3/1/2003 12:00:00 AM

Firstpage

386

Lastpage

388

Abstract

A high degree of frequency stability in an Er-fiber laser with the Fabry-Perot configuration was achieved using a long (25-km) optical-feedback loop. The frequency-drift rate was determined to be <1 MHz/min by observing temporal fringes in an unbalanced Mach-Zehnder interferometer. Instantaneous linewidth measured with a delayed self-heterodyne interferometer was less than the 3-kHz resolution limit. The laser was utilized in an optical time-domain reflectometry experiment to detect and locate a time-varying phase perturbation applied to an optical fiber.

Keywords

Fabry-Perot resonators; Mach-Zehnder interferometers; erbium; fibre lasers; laser frequency stability; optical fibre testing; optical time-domain reflectometry; spectral line breadth; 25 km; Fabry-Perot configuration; delayed self-heterodyne interferometer; frequency stability; frequency-drift rate; instantaneous linewidth; long optical-feedback loop; optical fiber; phase-sensitive optical time-domain reflectometry; resolution limit; spectrally stable Er-fiber laser; temporal fringes; time-varying phase perturbation; unbalanced Mach-Zehnder interferometer; Delay; Fabry-Perot; Fiber lasers; Frequency locked loops; Laser applications; Laser stability; Optical interferometry; Phase detection; Reflectometry; Time domain analysis;

fLanguage

English

Journal_Title

Photonics Technology Letters, IEEE

Publisher

ieee

ISSN

1041-1135

Type

jour

DOI

10.1109/LPT.2003.807905

Filename

1182766