Selective amplification of frequency comb modes via optical injection locking of a semiconductor laser: influence of adjacent unlocked comb modes

Abstract

Optical injection locking can be used to isolate and amplify individual comb modes from an optical frequency comb (OFC). However, it has been observed that for narrow spaced OFCs (e.g. 250 MHz), the adjacent comb modes are still present in the output of the locked laser. These residual modes experience some amplification relative to the injected signal, however the gain is significantly less than for the locked mode. We report the measurement of this sidemode amplification for a semiconductor laser injection locked to a 250 MHz spaced OFC. It was found that this amplification can be well suppressed by tuning the frequency difference between the free running laser and the OFC mode it was locked to. The sidemode amplification was then investigated numerically by solving the laser rate equations under optical injection. It was found that the main contribution to the sidemode amplification was due to phase modulation induced by the residual comb modes. The detuning dependent suppression occurs due to destructive interference between pairs of equidistant comb modes.