See discussions, stats, and author profiles for this publication at: https://www.researchgate.

net/publication/26800202

Analysis of frequency chirping of semiconductor lasers in the presence of

optical feedback

Article  in  Optics Letters · November 1987

DOI: 10.1364/OL.12.000800 · Source: PubMed

CITATIONS READS
16 151

3 authors:

Guang-Hua Duan Philippe Gallion

3SP Technologies Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers
397 PUBLICATIONS   4,694 CITATIONS    393 PUBLICATIONS   2,913 CITATIONS   

SEE PROFILE SEE PROFILE

G. Debarge
MINES ParisTech
38 PUBLICATIONS   980 CITATIONS   

SEE PROFILE

Some of the authors of this publication are also working on these related projects:

SIQURO - On silicon chip quantum optics for quantum computing and secure communications View project

Optical Low-Coherence Reflectometry View project

All content following this page was uploaded by Guang-Hua Duan on 20 May 2015.

The user has requested enhancement of the downloaded file.

 800 OPTICS LETTERS / Vol. 12, No. 10 / October 1987

Analysis of frequency chirping of semiconductor lasers in the

presence of optical feedback
G. Duan, P. Gallion, and G. Debarge
Ecole Nationale Sup6rieure des T6l6communications,Departement T6l6communication, 46, rue Barrault, 75634Paris Cedex 13, France

Received February 23, 1987; accepted July 10, 1987

The frequency chirping of a single-mode semiconductor laser in the presence of optical feedback is studied by rate-
equation analysis. The model includes the amplitude-phase-coupling and spectral-hole-burning effects. A simple
analytical formula is obtained in the small-signal regime that shows that the amplitude-phase-coupling effect also
enhances the chirp-reduction ratio and that the maximum reduction of frequency chirping can be achieved at the
same time as maximum line narrowing in the in-phase condition.

The strong nonlinear photon and carrier coupling in tions including the effect of amplitude-phase coupling
semiconductor lasers gives rise to simultaneous inten- in the presence of optical feedback. If P(t) and N(t)
sity modulation and frequency modulation or frequen- represent the number of photons and the number of
cy chirping under direct-current modulation.' The minority carriers, respectively, and 0(t) represents the
chirping properties are important for the design of optical phase of the lasing field, then their dynamic
long-distance and high-bit-rate optical communica- evolution in the weak-feedback case is governed by the
tion systems,2 and the knowledge of chirping provides following rate equations 8"14"15:
a useful way to study the interaction mechanism be-
tween photons and carriers in a semiconductor laser.3 P(t) = (G - y)P(t) + R + 2K[P(t)P(t _,r)]1/2
An analysis of frequency chirping has been made for X cos[wor+ (t) -0 (t-)], (2)
the solitary laser 2 4 and for the injection-locked laser.5
It is clear that the amplitude-phase-coupling effect6
and the spectral-hole-burning effect7 are two determi- RM) = I(t) - GPMt_ NMt)I (3)
nant factors affecting the chirp properties of a solitary e re
semiconductor laser. 2A In recent years the great in-
terest in coherent optical communication systems has (t) = cmoo- o + "(G -) [ P(t) J
led to extensive study of external-cavity semiconduc-
tor lasers because of their narrow spectral linewidth, X sin[wo
0r + 0(t) - 0(t -)], (4)
good frequency stability, and wavelength tunabil- where G is the gain or net rate of stimulated emission,
ity.81 3 The suppression 9 -13 of modulation-induced
R is the rate of spontaneous emission, y is the inverse
oscillation frequency chirping has also been extensive- of the photon decay time, re is the electron lifetime, a
ly investigated for this kind of laser configuration. is the linewidth-enhancement factor, K is the feedback
However, it seems that less attention has been paid to coefficient, X is the round-trip time in the external
the weak-feedback case, including the two effects cavity, 1(t) is the injection current, wiOOis the free
mentioned above. In this case the multiple reflections angular oscillation frequency, and wois the lasing an-
in the external cavity can be neglected, so we may gular frequency in the presence of optical feedback.
consider only the laser cavity itself. Our purpose in In our rate-equation model, the noise terms arising
this Letter is to give a complete analysis of frequency from spontaneous emission are neglected.
chirping of a single-mode semiconductor laser in the We limit our analysis to the small-modulation-sig-
presence of weak optical feedback by including these nal regime, in which we have
effects and to compare the chirp reduction with the
linewidth narrowing. I(t) = Ib + Im(t), (5)
A convenient measure of frequency chirping due to
direct-current modulation is the chirp-to-modulated-
power ratio (CPR), which is defined as 2' 4' 5 m= I <<1, (6)
b- Ith
CPR = 5v(j() (1) where Im is the modulation current, Ib is the bias cur-
e6pUj)
rent, Ith is the threshold current, and m is the modula-
where bv(jw) is the frequency deviation, bp(jw) is the tion depth.
modulated output power, and w is the angular fre- The standard procedure used to solve Eqs. (2)-(4) is
quency of modulation. to linearize P, N, and q5in terms of small deviations
The starting point of our analysis is the rate equa- around their steady values' 4"15:

0146-9592/87/100800-03$2.00/0 © 1987, Optical Society of America

 October 1987 / Vol. 12, No. 10 / OPTICS LETTERS 801

P(t) = P + aP(t), N(t) = N + AN(t),

10(t) = q5 + 65. (7)
Also, we assume that the optical phase q varies slow-
ly during the external-cavity round-trip time, i.e., o 4
jb'k(t) -r) << 7r/2.
1b0(t- (8) . 2

In the small sinusoidal modulation regime, the opti- . 1.

C = 0.5
cal phase is of the form 0 = Re[d exp(jwt)], so the
o 0-5 C = 0.8
assumed condition limits our analysis to the short- C= I
external-cavity case.
Under the above assumptions, the rate equations 0.2
can be written as
0.1

6P = (GpP- 6P(t) - K COSWOT[0P(t)

- 6P(t - T)]
0.051

+ GNPt6N- 2 KP sin wor[0(t) - (t -)], (9) Fig. 1. CPR modulus-reduction ratio ICPR/CPRoIas a
function of normalized oscillation phase without optical
feedback, i.e., wuOr, for different feedback strengths C = 0.5,
AN= (G + GpP)6P(t)- (GNP + 1 86N + I.(t) 0.8, 1.0.
rel e
(10)
= sin or[oP(t)- bP(t - r)]
It is evident that when K = 0 in Eq. (14), the CPR
changes to
+ aGNON- K cosw 0r[O¢>(t)- 64(t- r)], (11)
2
(CPR)o = ap (jco+ EGP+ RIP). (15)
where GN = aG/ON and GP = aG/OP. 47rP
Note that the spectral-hole-burning effect7 ex- This is the well-known CPR expression of a semicon-
pressed by Gpis included. By using the linear approx- ductor laser without optical feedback.2 - 5' 7 Figure 1
imation, G is expressed as shows the CPR modulus-reduction ratio as a function
G = rA(N - NO)(1- EP), (12) of normalized oscillation phase without optical feed-
back, i.e., wmOT, for different feedback strengths that
where r is the optical confinement factor, A is the are described by the characteristic parameter C (Ref.
differential gain, and e is the gain saturation factor 16):
that specifies the spectral-hole-burning effect. Fol-
lowing the standard linear treatment,14""5 neglecting C = KT(1 + a 2 )1/2 (16)
the term Gp only in Eq. (10), we obtain the following Other parameters used are the following: linewidth-
equations after Fourier transformation: enhancement factor a = 5.4, optical gain G = 5.0 X 1011
secC, photon number P = 1.4 X 105, spontaneous
[OPujw) 1 emission rate R = 1.3 X 1012 sec', gain saturation
(pI - M)I ON(Jw)= lo (13) factor e = 1.0 X 10-8, and modulation frequency
L0(jw)J I fm(=w/2r)= 3 GHz. In Fig. 1 we have used the nor-
[er~~a~~
-
malized free-oscillation phase (modulo 27r) because
where the lasing frequency c0 in the presence of optical feed-

- crA(N - VNO)P
+R - K cos cor[l - exp(-jwor)], rAP, -2KP sin cor[l - exp(-jcor)]
2
M = -FA(N - NO)(1- eP),
a TR1 0]
2 sin oor[i- exp(-jcor)], -PA, -K COS ( 0 rT[l- exp(-jcor)]
2P

and TR is the damping time associated with the relax-
ation oscillation. By solving Eq. (13) and using the
approximation 1 - exp(-jwr) = jw-r,which is valid for
a relatively short external cavity, then the CPR in the
presence of optical feedback is
back depends on the feedback strength.14 From the
figure we can see that both chirp narrowing and chirp
broadening may occur in the presence of optical feed-
back, according to the optical phase, and that the
condition for narrowing and broadening is approxi-

CPR 1 jwcd+ Kr(l + a2 )1"2 sin(w

0 r + tan-' a)] + a(eGP + RIP) (1
47rP 1 + KT(l + a 2 )1"2 COS(C0 T + tan-'a)
802 OPTICS LETTERS / Vol. 12, No. 10 / October 1987
mately the same for linewidth narrowing and broaden-
ing. In the in-phase condition, wor + tan-' a = 2m7r,
the maximum reduction of frequency chirping is
achieved, and the reduction ratio Xq
is
1 + Ks(1 (17)
1 + KcT(l + a2)1/2
which is just the square root of the linewidth-reduc-
tion ratio."4 This result is not surprising since the
linewidth arises from fluctuations of the optical phase.
Also, in the out-of-phase condition chirp increases at
the same time as linewidth broadening. For weak
feedback, C S 1, the influence of optical feedback on
the CPR phase is negligible. It is worth noting that
the amplitude-phase-coupling effect also enhances
the chirp-reduction ratio and that it changes the in-
phase condition by adding tan-' a. When this cou-
pling effect is neglected, the result reduces to the form
obtained by Saito et al.9
We have investigated the effect of optical feedback
on the frequency-chirping properties of a single-mode
semiconductor laser. We have found that the optical
phase plays an important role in determining chirp
narrowing or chirp broadening. We have pointed out
that chirp narrowing is enhanced by amplitude-phase
coupling in semiconductor lasers. By comparing the
chirp reduction with the linewidth narrowing we have
shown that the maximum chirp reduction is achieved
in the in-phase condition, which is the same for
linewidth narrowing, and that this maximum ratio -1is
just the square root of the linewidth-reduction ratio.
A similar discussion about chirp reduction in the pres-
ence of optical feedback was proposed recently by
Henry and Kazarinov'7 in a different manner. Fur-
View publication stats
ther experimental verification of the CPR in the pres-
ence of optical feedback is in progress.
References
1. S. Kobayashi, Y. Yamamoto, M. Ito, and T. Kimura,
IEEE J. Quantum Electron. QE-18, 582 (1982).
2. T. L. Koch and J. E. Bowers, Electron. Lett. 25, 1038
(1984).
3. C. Harder, K. Vahala, and A. Yariv, Appl. Phys. Lett. 42,
328 (1983).
4. D. Welford, IEEE J. Quantum Electron. QE-21, 1749
(1985).
5. S. Piazzolla, P. Spano, and M. Tamburrini, IEEE J.
Quantum Electron. QE-22, 2219 (1986).
6. C. H. Henry, IEEE J. Quantum Electron. QE-18, 259
(1982).
7. R. S. Tucker, IEEE J. Lightwave Technol. LT-3, 1180
(1985).
8. R. Lang and K. Kobayashi, IEEE J. Quantum Electron.
QE-16, 347 (1980).
9. S. Saito, 0. Nilsson, and Y. Yamamoto, IEEE J. Quan-
tum Electron. QE-18, 961 (1982).
10. T. Fujita, J. Ohya, S. Ishizuko, K. Fujito, and H. Sato,
Electron. Lett. 20, 416 (1984).
11. G. P. Agrawal, J. Appl. Phys. 56, 3110 (1984).
12. K. Vahala and A. Yariv, Appl. Phys. Lett. 45,501 (1984).
13. K. Vahala, J. Paslaski and A. Yariv, Appl. Phys. Lett. 46,
1025 (1985).
14. G. P. Agrawal, IEEE J. Quantum Electron. QE-20, 468
(1984).
15. P. Gallion and G. Debarge, Electron. Lett. 7, 264 (1985).
16. G. A. Acket, D. Lenstra, A. J. Den Boef, and B. H.
Verbeek, IEEE J. Quantum Electron. QE-20, 1163
(1984).
17. C. H. Henry and R. F. Kazarinov, in Proceedings of the
Tenth IEEE International SemiconductorLaser Con-
ference (Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engi-
neers, Kanazawa, Japan, 1986), paper C2.