Phase-locking of commercial DFB lasers for distributed optical fiber sensing applications

Chris D. Rouse; Anthony W Brown; Michael T. V. Wylie; Bruce G. Colpitts

doi:10.1117/12.885109

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17 May 2011 Phase-locking of commercial DFB lasers for distributed optical fiber sensing applications

Chris D. Rouse, Anthony W Brown, Michael T. V. Wylie, Bruce G. Colpitts

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Proceedings Volume 7753, 21st International Conference on Optical Fiber Sensors; 77532L (2011) https://doi.org/10.1117/12.885109
Event: 21st International Conference on Optical Fibre Sensors (OFS21), 2011, Ottawa, Canada

Abstract

The design of a phase/frequency detector-based optical phase-locked loop (PFD-OPLL) capable of locking two commercial semiconductor distributed feedback (DFB) lasers for the purpose of making Brillouin Optical Time-Domain Analysis (BOTDA) measurements is presented. Due to the aperiodic nature of the PFD transfer characteristic, the PFDOPLL offers strong acquisition performance without requiring additional acquisition hardware. Design constraints due to laser linewidths are relaxed by choosing a damping factor of 3.5 instead of 0.707. Loop stability is ensured by reducing the loop propagation delay by as much as possible in hardware, and choosing the loop natural frequency such that the loop bandwidth is below the FM phase reversal frequency of the laser. Results show stable lock performance at 11 GHz with a phase noise of -70dBc/Hz at a 100 Hz offset, a capture range of 2.5 GHz and a tuning range of 3.3 GHz. These specifications exceed the performance requirements of a BOTDA system.

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Chris D. Rouse, Anthony W Brown, Michael T. V. Wylie, and Bruce G. Colpitts "Phase-locking of commercial DFB lasers for distributed optical fiber sensing applications", Proc. SPIE 7753, 21st International Conference on Optical Fiber Sensors, 77532L (17 May 2011); https://doi.org/10.1117/12.885109

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