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Optica Publishing Group
  • Journal of Lightwave Technology
  • Vol. 32,
  • Issue 20,
  • pp. 3489-3494
  • (2014)

Ultralow Noise and High-Power VECSEL for High Dynamic Range and Broadband RF/Optical Links

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Abstract

We describe a compact, ultralow noise, and high-power semiconductor laser implemented in a high performances wideband externally modulated optical link. The laser is based on a vertical external cavity surface emitting laser (VECSEL) designed for high-power and low-noise operation. Thanks to a specific design of the gain chip, the half-VCSEL, based on a metamorphic Bragg mirror and a report on a copper substrate, an optical power of 110 mW is obtained at 1.55 μm in the single frequency regime. For low-noise operation, the laser cavity is designed for free-relaxation-oscillations operation, i.e., in the so-called class-A regime. The Class-A VECSEL exhibits a relative intensity noise below −170 dB/Hz over a wide frequency bandwidth, from 300 MHz to 40 GHz, except at the laser free spectral range (20.4 GHz). In the low-frequency range, the laser noise, mainly due to transfer of pump noise to laser noise, goes from −110 dB/Hz at 1 kHz down to −158 dB/Hz at 10 MHz. Two externally modulated optical links are implemented and compared in terms of the RF gain and the noise figure. The first optical link is based on the ultralow noise class-A VECSEL and the second one is based on a low noise class-B DFB laser. Thanks to the outstanding noise properties of the designed VECSEL, the VECSEL-based optical link outperforms the DFB-based one, in particular for frequencies larger than 20 GHz.

© 2014 IEEE

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