High average-power, low-jitter, 10-GHz semiconductor modelocked laser system

Summary form only given. The development of an all semiconductor-based 10 GHz repetition rate, 100 mW average power, sub 60 fs jitter pulse train is shown. All devices described are ridge-guided single mode waveguides. Modelocked pulses at 1.55 /spl mu/m were generated from a harmonically modelocked external cavity with fundamental frequency of 1 GHz. A low-capacitance, two-section curved waveguide gain element was utilized to actively modelock the cavity at 10 GHz by driving the short 50 /spl mu/m long modulator section with 17 dBm of RF power. Stable modelocking produced 8-ps pulses with an average output power of 0.3 mW. These pulses were initially amplified to the 10 mW level by single-pass through a 2.0 mm long angled-stripe semiconductor optical amplifier driven with 130 mA of forward bias.