This advancement in miniaturizing MLL technology might substantially broaden the applications of photonics.Innovations in Mode-Locked Laser TechnologySetting out to enhance a technology that normally requires large, bench-top equipment, Quishi Guo and coworkers have actually diminished a mode-locked laser (MLL) to the size of an optical chip with an incorporated nanophotonic platform. The outcomes show promise for establishing ultrafast nanophotonic systems for a broad range of applications.Potential of Miniaturized MLLsMode-locked lasers (MLLs) can produce meaningful ultrashort pulses of light at incredibly fast speeds– on the order of femtoseconds and picoseconds. Whats more, so-called “incorporated” MLLs implied to drive nanophotonic platforms suffer from critical constraints like low peak power and a lack of controllability.Breakthrough in Nanophotonic MLL IntegrationThrough hybrid integration of a semiconductor optical amplifier chip with a novel thin-film lithium niobate nanophotonic circuit, Guo et al. developed an incorporated MLL the size of an optical chip.According to the authors, the MLL generates ultrashort ~ 4.8 picosecond optical pulses at around 1065 nanometers with a peak power of ~ 0.5 Watts– the highest output pulse energy and peak power of any integrated MLLs in nanophotonic platforms.In addition, the scientists showed that the repetition rate of the incorporated MLL can be tuned over ~ 200 megahertz variety, and that the lasers coherence homes can be specifically managed, providing a path toward a totally stabilized on-chip nanophotonic frequency comb source.For more on this development: Reference: “Ultrafast mode-locked laser in nanophotonic lithium niobate” by Qiushi Guo, Benjamin K. Gutierrez, Ryoto Sekine, Robert M. Gray, James A. Williams, Luis Ledezma, Luis Costa, Arkadev Roy, Selina Zhou, Mingchen Liu and Alireza Marandi, 9 November 2023, Science.DOI: 10.1126/ science.adj5438.
