Tunable optical delay line using two port ring resonator

Abstract

Adjustable optical delay lines are important functional elements in ultra fast optical science and technology. Optical delay lines have some important applications in optical communication systems, all optical computer architecture and in phased arrays antenna. Also, for all optical systems, integrated optical delay line for introducing compact, fast and reliable block is critical device. In this paper, we present a novel structure for optical tunable delay line using thermo optical effect. The proposed idea, presents the fundamental properties of single-mode fiber ring-resonator for extracting tunable and large delay lines. Also, we show that it can be controlled and tuned by applying control signal to optical waveguide medium. This device enables to have tuning ranges up to 8 ns for two stages of array of ring resonators. It is obvious that with increase of the number of ring resonator in the proposed array the obtained delay time can be increased.