A New and Simple Frequency Quadrupling Millimeter-Wave Signal Generation Enabled by a Single Mach-Zehnder Modulator Without Optical Filter

Abstract

In this work, we have designed and proposed a new optical method to realize the generating of frequency quadrupling millimeter-wave (mm-wave) only employing one Mach-Zehnder modulator (MZM), and no any optical filter is needed. Compared with the previously reported quadruple frequency scheme, this work greatly simplifies the structure of the system, and makes the performance better and the cost lower. In the scheme, the MZM is operated at peak bias point, which is applied to retain the even order optical sidebands and wipe off the odd order optical harmonics. By tuning-up the optical shifter and optical attenuator (OATT) to control the zeroth order optical carrier returns zero, only ±2nd order optical tones are generated. We demonstrated and discussed the presented scheme feasibility based on the detailed mathematical formula derivation and numerical simulation, the simulation results of which show that employing a sinusoidal radio frequency (RF) source with frequency at 10 GHz to drive a push-pull MZM, a 40 GHz millimeter-wave (mm-wave) signal can be obtained. In the work, the performance of the generated quadrupling signal is that the optical sideband suppression ratio (OSSR) is 34.8 dB and the radio frequency sideband suppression ratio (RFSSR) can reach 27.2 dB.