A WAVELENGTH CONVERSION BASED ON CROSS-GAIN MODULATION OF A SEMICONDUCTOR OPTICAL AMPLIFIER FIBER RING LOOP

Abstract

We investigate the cross-gain modulation (XGM) in a semiconductor optical amplifier (SOA) fiber ring loop theoretically and experimentally. Based on the XGM, a wavelength conversion is designed. We experimentally carry out an SOA wavelength conversion, which converts a 20 MHz sinusoidal modulated input optical signal at a wavelength of 1317 nm to an output optical signal at a wavelength of 1314.3 nm. In this type of wavelength conversion, a tunable optical filter is utilized to select the target wavelength of the output signal from the fiber ring loop, and this target wavelength signal is accumulated and amplified as the resonance of the fiber ring loop. The introduction of the tunable optical filter into the fiber ring loop system makes it very easy to obtain any desired target wavelength from this XGM wavelength conversion system; this remarkable property means that the SOA wavelength conversions have broader applications in optical networking and beyond. Higher frequency modulation XGM wavelength conversion may be obtained by scaling down the length of the fiber ring loop.