Narrow linewidth semiconductor multi-wavelength DFB laser array simultaneously self-injection locked to a single microring resonator.

Abstract

We experimentally demonstrate a narrow linewidth semiconductor multi-wavelength distributed feedback (DFB) laser array by simultaneously injection locking each laser to the corresponding resonance of a single on-chip microring resonator. The white frequency noises of all the DFB lasers is reduced by more than 40 dB once they are simultaneously injection locked to a single microring resonator with a quality factor (Q-factor) of 2.38 million. Correspondingly, the instantaneous linewidths of all the DFB lasers are narrowed by a factor of 104. In addition, frequency combs originating from non-degenerate four-wave mixing (FWM) between the locked DFB lasers are also observed. Simultaneously injection locking multi-wavelength lasers to a single on-chip resonator may enable the possibilities of integrating a narrow-linewidth semiconductor laser array on a single chip and having multiple microcombs in a single resonator, which are in high demand in wavelength division multiplexing coherent optical communication systems and metrological applications.