<title>Experimental investigation on the C+L-band super-fluorescence fiber source</title>

Abstract

A novel super-fluorescence fiber source (SFS) in the wavelength range that covers the C+L-band with stable spectrum, high output power and high slope efficiency is demonstrated. The topology consists of two stages: the first stage provides primarily the L-band gain spectrum whilst the second is solely for the C-band. These two stages are combined in series. We merely used the low erbium-doped fiber (EDF) 10.8m long as a gain medium in the second stage, which was pumped backward by a 980nm semiconductor laser diode (LD). As a result, the Amplified Spontaneous Emission (ASE) spectrum had a threshold of 5.1mW and a slope efficiency of 13.48% in the C-band. With a 980 nm LD pumping forward at 11-m-long moderate EDF and 58-m-long low EDF in series, L-band ASE was yielded with 52.3 mW threshold and a slope efficiency of 35.82% in the first stage. The ASE in the L-band was put into the second stage through an isolator and combined with C-band ASE as an output then a broad ASE spectrum of C+L-band was observed. The maximum output power of the C+L-band source was 33mW (15.3dBm) and its power stability was better than ±0.02 dB. Through the optimization of fiber parameters and the adjustment of pumping power in both stages, the flatness of ASE spectrum was improved. The optical bandwidth for the SFS output power, which ripples in 3 dB, was 63.7 nm (1536.92-1600.62 nm) of optical bandwidth without gain flattening filter.