Band-selective C- or L-band erbium-doped fiber amplified spontaneous emission source

Abstract

Abstract. Two novel methods are demonstrated to build upa band-selective amplified spontaneous emission ASEbroadband light source that can operate in the selective con-ventional band C-band, 1525 1565 nm or long-wavelength band L-band, 1565 1605 nm region using a1 2 optical switch. With the backward ASE feedback tech-nique, an output power of 27.6 mW for the C-band ASE and11.8 mW for the L-band ASE are obtained while with thecompound pump technique, a power of 24.5 mW for L-bandASE and 27.2 mW for C-band ASE are obtained both with afixed total pump power of 100 mW. The advantage of usingthe backward ASE feedback technique is that the ASEsource design is simpler whereas the power of L-band ASEis lower, and the notable advantage of using the compoundpump technique is that the output powers of the two selec-tive bands C- or L-band are balanced though the configu-ration is a little complicated. © 2006 Society of Photo-Optical Instru-mentation Engineers. DOI: 10.1117/1.2171952 Subject terms: fluorescence; erbium lasers; opticalcommunications; fiber optics