Characterization of a high coherence, Brillouin microcavity laser on silicon

Abstract

Recently, a high efficiency, narrow-linewidth, chip-based stimulated Brillouin laser (SBL) was demonstrated using an ultra-high-Q, silica-on-silicon resonator. In this work, this novel laser is more fully characterized. The Schawlow Townes linewidth formula for Brillouin laser operation is derived and compared to linewidth data, and the fitting is used to measure the mechanical thermal quanta contribution to the Brillouin laser linewidth. A study of laser mode pulling by the Brillouin optical gain spectrum is also presented, and high-order, cascaded operation of the SBL is demonstrated. Potential application of these devices to microwave sources and phase-coherent communication is discussed. (C) 2012 Optical Society of America