High-Transmittance Femtosecond Optical Kerr Gate with Double Gate Pulses Based on Birefringence Effect
Zhenqiang Huang,
Wenjiang Tan,
Jinhai Si,
Shijia Zeng,
Zhen Kang,
Xun Hou
Affiliations
Zhenqiang Huang
Key Laboratory for Physical Electronics and Devices of the Ministry of Education, Shannxi Key Lab of Information Photonic Technique, School of Electronic Science and Engineering, Xi’an Jiaotong University, Xianning-xilu 28, Xi’an 710049, China
Wenjiang Tan
Key Laboratory for Physical Electronics and Devices of the Ministry of Education, Shannxi Key Lab of Information Photonic Technique, School of Electronic Science and Engineering, Xi’an Jiaotong University, Xianning-xilu 28, Xi’an 710049, China
Jinhai Si
Key Laboratory for Physical Electronics and Devices of the Ministry of Education, Shannxi Key Lab of Information Photonic Technique, School of Electronic Science and Engineering, Xi’an Jiaotong University, Xianning-xilu 28, Xi’an 710049, China
Shijia Zeng
Key Laboratory for Physical Electronics and Devices of the Ministry of Education, Shannxi Key Lab of Information Photonic Technique, School of Electronic Science and Engineering, Xi’an Jiaotong University, Xianning-xilu 28, Xi’an 710049, China
Zhen Kang
Key Laboratory for Physical Electronics and Devices of the Ministry of Education, Shannxi Key Lab of Information Photonic Technique, School of Electronic Science and Engineering, Xi’an Jiaotong University, Xianning-xilu 28, Xi’an 710049, China
Xun Hou
Key Laboratory for Physical Electronics and Devices of the Ministry of Education, Shannxi Key Lab of Information Photonic Technique, School of Electronic Science and Engineering, Xi’an Jiaotong University, Xianning-xilu 28, Xi’an 710049, China
An optical Kerr gate (OKG) is an ultrafast optical switch based on the optical Kerr effect. The performance of a conventional OKG depends mainly on Kerr materials. Traditional Kerr materials do not demonstrate both large optical nonlinearity and an ultrafast response time. Therefore, the performance of a conventional OKG is limited by an inherent trade-off between high signal transmittance and fast switching time, which limits its application in many fields. We propose an improved femtosecond OKG with double gate pulses, based on the use of a birefringent crystal to realize an ultrashort switching time, even with a slow-response optical Kerr medium. We assessed the dependence of the double gate pulsed OKG (D-OKG)’s performance on the intensity ratio of the double gate pulses. A transmittance of 50% and a switching time of 142 fs were achieved. The D-OKG is convenient to construct, and its integrated performance is superior to that of a conventional OKG.
