Ultrastable Offset-Locking Continuous Wave Laser to a Frequency Comb with a Compound Control Method for Precision Interferometry

Abstract

A simple and robust analog feedforward and digital feedback compound control system is presented to lock the frequency of a slave continuous wave (CW) laser to an optical frequency comb. The beat frequency between CW laser and the adjacent comb mode was fed to an acousto-optical frequency shifter (AOFS) to compensate the frequency dithering of the CW laser. A digital feedback loop was achieved to expand the operation bandwidth limitation of the AOFS by over an order of magnitude. The signal-to-noise ratio of the interference signal was optimized using a grating-based spectral filtering detection unit. The complete system achieved an ultrastable offset-locking of the slave CW laser to the frequency comb with a relative stability of ±3.62 × 10−14. The Allan deviations of the beat frequency were 8.01 × 10−16 and 2.19 × 10−16 for a gate time of 10 s and 1000 s, respectively. The findings of this study may further improve laser interferometry by providing a simple and robust method for ultrastable frequency control.