A tunable wavelength laser comprising a laser cavity formed by a broadband mirror and a comb mirror. The laser cavity comprising a gain region. The laser cavity is configured such that a non-integer number of cavity modes of the laser cavity are between two consecutive reflection peaks of the comb mirror.

An optical source is described. This optical source includes a semiconductor optical amplifier (with a semiconductor other than silicon) that provides an optical gain medium and that includes a reflector. Moreover the hybrid external cavity laser includes a photonic chip with: an optical waveguide that conveys an optical signal output by the semiconductor optical amplifier; and a ring resonator, having a resonance wavelength, which reflects at least a resonance wavelength in the optical signal, where the reflector and the ring resonator define an optical cavity. Furthermore, the photonic chip includes: a thermal-tuning mechanism that adjusts the resonance wavelength; a photo-detector that measures an optical power output by the ring resonator; and control logic that adjusts the temperature of the ring resonator based on the measured optical power to lock a cavity mode of the optical cavity to a carrier wavelength.

A multi-wavelength laser and a wavelength control method are disclosed. The multi-wavelength laser includes a waveguide, a first electrode, and a second electrode. The first electrode and the second electrode are disposed on the waveguide. The first electrode is electrically isolated from the second electrode. The first electrode includes a plurality of sub-electrodes, and every two adjacent sub-electrodes are electrically isolated. The second electrode is configured to amplify an optical signal in the waveguide by loading a current. At least one sub-electrode is configured to adjust a wavelength of the optical signal in the waveguide by loading a current or a voltage.

The present invention discloses a tunable semiconductor laser based on half-wave coupled partial reflectors. The laser comprises two resonant cavities; one resonant cavity is mainly composed of an optical waveguide, a first partial reflector and a second partial reflector, and the other resonant cavity is mainly composed of an optical waveguide, a first partial reflector and a second partial reflector. The resonant cavities are arranged along the same straight line and coupled to each other, and the two second partial reflectors in the two resonant cavities are connected by a common coupling waveguide. The present invention has the best single-mode selection, and an emitted wavelength can be switched between a series of channels; an optical grating needs not to be manufactured, and the structure is simple; and the laser has a high degree of freedom in coupler design and a great manufacturing tolerance and can realize large-scale digital tuning.

A laser comprising a narrow linewidth, comprising: a grating along a laser cavity; a laser waveguide having a plurality of waveguide sections corresponding to a plurality of grating sections, each of the plurality of waveguide sections having a ridge/mesa width for detuning the grating in each of the plurality of grating sections; and a plurality of contact electrodes contacting each of the plurality of waveguide sections, the plurality of contact electrodes for applying a different current to each of the plurality of waveguide sections to enable active feedback noise suppression.

A narrow linewidth laser includes a passive ring resonant cavity, an FP resonant cavity, and a first gain region. The passive ring resonant cavity and the FP resonant cavity are combined to form an M-Z (Mach-Zehnder interference structure) compound external cavity structure, and the M-Z compound external cavity structure is at least used for providing wavelength selection and narrowing laser linewidth. The first gain region is provided on the outer side of the M-Z compound external cavity structure and is used for providing a gain for the whole laser. The narrow linewidth laser is simple in structure, high in side-mode suppression ratio, narrow in linewidth, and high in output power. By further integrating a PN junction region or MOS junction region, broadband and rapid tuning with low power consumption can also be achieved, and tuning management is simple.

A discrete wavelength tunable laser capable of switching between a plurality of lasing channels of different wavelengths, the tunable laser comprising: a semiconductor optical amplifier (SOA); a wavelength demultiplexer (Demux), having a Demux input which receives the output from the SOA, and a plurality of Demux outputs, each Demux output defining a different spatial path for a respective lasing channel; each of the respective lasing channels being within the bandwidth of the SOA; a reflector located within each spatial path for reflecting light of the respective lasing channel; and a lasing suppression mechanism located within each lasing channel; wherein one or more desired lasing channels are selected by application of the lasing suppression mechanism in each spatial path other than the one or more spatial paths corresponding to the one or more desired lasing channels.

A monolithic laser device assembly 10A in the present disclosure includes a first gain portion 20 having a first end portion 20A and a second end portion 20B, a second gain portion 30 having a third end portion 30A and a fourth end portion 30B, one or multiple ring resonators 40, a semiconductor optical amplifier 50 for amplifying a laser light emitted from the first gain portion 20, and a pulse selector 60 disposed between the first gain portion 20 and the semiconductor optical amplifier 50, in which the ring resonator 40 is optically coupled with the first gain portion 20 and with the second gain portion 30, and laser oscillation is performed on either the first gain portion 20 or the second gain portion 30.

A system where a laser (202) having an input that controls the frequency of laser emission, an optical frequency discriminator (210), and a control system (230) are configured such that the laser frequency can be swept according to a desired function of time. In particular a linear triangular frequency output is achieved which is a repeating sequence of linearly increasing optical frequency and a linearly decreasing optical frequency. The control system relies on a frequency discriminator signal to obtain the information about laser frequency. During generation of repeating swept frequency waveforms the laser frequency remains between the adjacent periodic features of the discriminator optical frequency response. The control system dynamically or iteratively optimizes the laser frequency control signal in order to maintain the desired laser optical frequency sweep.

Provided are a laser device and a method of transforming laser spectrum, which provide a laser frequency stabilization and significant narrowing a laser spectrum. A laser device includes at least one multiple longitudinal mode laser (L) for generating a laser light having a spectrum of multiple longitudinal modes; at least one high quality factor (high-Q) microresonator (M) optically feedback coupled to the at least one multiple longitudinal mode laser (L); and a tuner (TU) for tuning the spectrum of multiple longitudinal modes of the laser light. The laser device is configured to output an output laser light having an output spectrum with at least one dominant longitudinal laser mode each at a reduced linewidth of the dominant longitudinal laser mode. The laser device allows increasing an emission power of a narrow linewidth lasing without an additional amplification while keeping a compact size of a device with a limited number of optical elements.