<title>The semiconductor laser diode with the integrated AWG-multiplexer as external cavity</title>

Abstract

Operating features of gain-guided Fabry-Perot (FP) laser diode (λ~1.55μm) in a continuous mode with integrated optical AWG-multiplexer as an external resonant cavity is investigated. The laser diode with antireflection coating (0.5%) facet and AWG-structure with external mirror as in-cavity frequency resonant selector is employed. The waveguide for AWG-structure was based on use of a silicon oxinitride (SiON) core and silicon oxide cladding layers with narrow mode (~5μm), size of AWG chip 10x10 mm, 1.55-μm band, 8x8 channels, wavelength channel spacing is 0.8 nm, crosstalk -25dB, the optical propagation losses ~3 dB. In the experiments we could achieve a narrow line generation corresponding to the AWG transmission spectrum. The lasing frequency was defined by switching of AWG-multiplexer channel. Furthermore, we have investigated the case of complex cavity build up of the FP laser diode with facets without coating and AWG-structure. In this case we have found the essential increase of Q-factor of the single line over FP laser diode cavity lines set. Actually, investigated laser cavities can be applied for creating the switched laser sources for WDM and ROADM networks, with requirements of narrow line width and switching between different wavelength lasing according ITU-grid.