Abstract

A new silicon optoelectronic oscillator (OEO) system is proposed and experimentally demonstrated. The proposed OEO, generates the microwave signal by beating the un-modulated and amplitude-modulated versions of the same laser source. The drop port of a silicon micro-resonator is used to select one of the side band lobes generated by the amplitude modulation, thus serving as frequency selective element in the OEO. In this scheme, the microwave frequency generated is determined by the wavelength separation between the laser and the ring resonance. Thus, seamless microwave frequency tuning can be achieved just by sweeping the wavelength of the laser source. A proof-of-concept demonstration is implemented, experimentally showing microwave frequency generation in the range from 5.9 GHz to 18.2 GHz.

© 2019 The Author(s)