Tunable laser system

Abstract

The invention relates to a tunable laser system. The first kind of structure of the system comprises an output light beam collimating lens, a first laser cavity reflector, laser gain media, a collimating lens in a cavity, an active light phase modulator, a first tunable acousto-optic filter, a second tunable acousto-optic filter, a tunable Fabry-Perot filter and a second laser cavity reflector, wherein the first laser cavity reflector, the laser gain media, the collimating lens in the cavity, the active light phase modulator, the first tunable acousto-optic filter, the second tunable acousto-optic filter, the tunable Fabry-Perot filter and the second laser cavity reflector are sequentially installed. According to second kind of structure of the system, a Fabry-Perot etalon with fixed frequency intervals is further arranged in the first structure, so that the frequency bandwidth of laser output light beams is further compressed, and the output light of the laser is made to be uniform with the transmitted spectrum of the Fabry-Perot etalon in peak value. The tunable laser system has the advantages of being reasonable in design, being provided with non-mechanical moving parts, being stable and reliable in performance, low in cost, small in size, and easy to install and produce, and the like.

Description

technical field [0001] The invention belongs to the field of optoelectronics, in particular to a tuneable laser system using a tuneable Fabry-Perot filter and a tuneable acousto-optic filter. Background technique [0002] In external-cavity broadband tunable lasers, the commonly used tuning techniques mainly include the following methods: 1. Tuning is carried out by driving the rotation of the grating through a precision stepping motor. The existing problems are reflected in: First, to achieve precise tuning of optical frequency , the stepping accuracy and repeatability requirements of the stepping motor are very high, so the manufacturing cost is relatively high; the second is that it is not easy to miniaturize due to the use of a stepping motor; the third is that the working stability in harsh working environments is relatively poor, In particular, the ability to resist various mechanical vibrations is relatively poor. Therefore, the tunable laser using this technology is ...

AI Technical Summary

Problems solved by technology

[0002]In the external cavity broadband tunable laser, the commonly used tuning techniques mainly include the following methods: 1. The tuning is carried out by driving the rotation of the grating by a precision stepping motor, and the The existing problems are reflected in: First, in order to realize the precise tuning of optical frequency, the stepping accuracy and repeatability of the stepping motor are required to be very high, so the manufacturing cost is relatively high; second, due to the use of stepping motors, it is not easy to achieve miniaturization ; The third is that the working stability in harsh working environments is relatively poor, especially the ability to resist various mechanical vibrations is relatively poor. Therefore, tunable lasers using this technology are only suitable for use in laboratory working environments

2. Using tunable acousto-optic filters for tuning has the advantages of fast tuning speed, no mechanical moving parts, and can be miniaturized. The disadvantage is that the filter bandwidth of tunable acousto-optic filters is relatively wide, which makes the tuning accuracy of the laser lower. High, therefore, it is difficult to achieve precise continuous tunability of tunable lasers using this technology alone, and it is only suitable for applications that do not require high tuning accuracy and output bandwidth

3. Use gratings or other optical filter devices in the laser resonator, such as optical etalons, to tune the frequency of transmitted light with temperature drift. The advantages are high tuning accuracy and narrow spectral bandwidth of the output light. The disadvantage is that the speed is relatively high. Slow, especially in the case where a wide tuning spectrum range is required, this shortcoming is particularly obvious, for example: the temperature drift coefficient of the optical filter device is 0.02 nanometers / degree, the required optical spectrum range is 20 nanometers, and the temperature adjustment range is 100 degrees, This is difficult to achieve in practical applications

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