近日，德国电子同步加速器研究所的Neetesh Singh及其研究团队取得一项新进展。经过不懈努力，他们研制出基于硅光子功率放大器的亚2W可调谐激光器。相关研究成果已于2025年1月2日在国际知名学术期刊《光：科学与应用》上发表。

为此，在这项工作中，研究人员展示了这样一种技术，并借助基于硅光子学的大模场面积（LMA）功率放大器，实现了一种非常高功率的可调谐激光器。研究人员证实在1.83μm至1.89μm的60nm可调谐范围内，输出功率达到了1.8W，这一限制仅由种子激光器决定。这种集成LMA器件可以显著提高现有集成可调谐激光器的功率，而现有激光器的功率通常仅限于几十毫瓦。此处展示的功率水平已达到并超越了许多台式系统的水平，这真正使基于硅光子学的集成LMA器件有望在不依赖台式系统的情况下，大规模部署于高功率应用领域。

据悉，高功率可调谐激光器因其在电信、测距和分子传感等领域的巨大应用潜力而备受追捧。然而，集成光子学通常被认为不适用于高功率应用，这主要归因于其较小的尺寸限制了能量存储能力，进而限制了输出功率。20世纪90年代末，为了改善光束质量并增加存储能量，人们引入了大模场面积（LMA）光纤，其光学模场面积显著增大。自此以后，这种LMA光纤极大地提升了光纤系统的高功率处理能力。将此类LMA技术引入芯片尺度，同样有可能发挥颠覆性作用，使集成光子学系统能够产生高功率信号。

附：英文原文

Title: Sub-2W tunable laser based on silicon photonics power amplifier

Author: Singh, Neetesh, Lorenzen, Jan, Kilinc, Muharrem, Wang, Kai, Sinobad, Milan, Francis, Henry, Carreira, Jose, Geiselmann, Michael, Demirbas, Umit, Pergament, Mikhail, Garcia-Blanco, Sonia M., Krtner, Franz X.

Issue&Volume: 2025-01-02

Abstract: High-power tunable lasers are intensely pursued due to their vast application potential such as in telecom, ranging, and molecular sensing. Integrated photonics, however, is usually considered not suitable for high-power applications mainly due to its small size which limits the energy storage capacity and, therefore, the output power. In the late 90s, to improve the beam quality and increase the stored energy, large-mode-area (LMA) fibers were introduced in which the optical mode area is substantially large. Such LMA fibers have transformed the high-power capability of fiber systems ever since. Introducing such an LMA technology at the chip-scale can play an equally disruptive role with high power signal generation from an integrated photonics system. To this end, in this work we demonstrate such a technology, and show a very high-power tunable laser with the help of a silicon photonics based LMA power amplifier. We show output power reaching 1.8W over a tunability range of 60nm, spanning from 1.83μm to 1.89μm, limited only by the seed laser. Such an integrated LMA device can be used to substantially increase the power of the existing integrated tunable lasers currently limited to a few tens of milliwatts. The power levels demonstrated here reach and surpass that of many benchtop systems which truly makes the silicon photonics based integrated LMA device poised towards mass deployment for high power applications without relying on benchtop systems.

DOI: 10.1038/s41377-024-01681-1

Source: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41377-024-01681-1