Ultralow Noise and Timing Jitter Semiconductor Quantum-Dot Passively Mode-Locked Laser for Terabit/s Optical Networks

Abstract

Diode optical frequency comb lasers are promising compact solutions to generate high-speed optical pulses for applications in high spectral efficiency wavelength division multiplexing transmission with advanced modulation formats. In this paper, an InAs/InP quantum dot (QDot) C-band single-section passively mode-locked laser (MLL) based broadband optical frequency comb source with a free spectral range of 28.4 GHz is presented. The device exhibits less than 1.5 MHz optical linewidth (phase noise) over 56 channels and 2.1 fs pulse-to-pulse timing jitter with a central wavelength of 1550 nm. Using this comb, we demonstrate an aggregate data transmission capacity of 12.5 Terabit/s over 100 km of standard single mode fiber by employing dual-polarization with 16 QAM modulation format. This investigation shows the viability for semiconductor QDot MLLs to be used as low-cost optical source in Terabit/s or higher optical networks.