Agile offset frequency locking for single-frequency fiber lasers

Abstract

Single frequency fiber lasers (SFFLs) have seen increasing applications in state-of-the-art quantum technologies, which usually require precise and stable offset frequency locking (OFL). However, limited by the piezoelectric transducer bandwidth in SFFLs and the loop bandwidth of the OFL, the large-gap jumping between two locked offset frequencies will take an undesirable amount of time. In order to diminish that consuming time, we developed an agile offset frequency locking system based on a hybrid loop of a feed-forward path and a feedback path. In accordance with the experimental demonstration, we characterized the performances of the offset frequency locking system, as frequency-locking stability with an Allan deviation of 3.2 × 10−14 at 1 s averaging time and jumping agility with a duration of 0.6 ms at 1.3 GHz frequency gap, which is a factor of 60 faster than that without the feed-forward path. This mechanism can find direct applications in existing quantum metrology experiments with SFFLs where high-speed frequency jumping or sweeping is needed.