Abstract

There is great interest in using fiber superfluorescent sources in fiber gyroscopes as a replacement for semiconductor superluminescent diodes (SLD's). Potential benefits include higher available power, better wavelength stability with temperature, and improved lifetime. Multicore Nd:fibers¹ pumped by a laser diode array offer high output powers in a single mode core, but are susceptible to lasing due to feedback². This type of diode laser pumped source has been successfully employed in a fiber gyroscope using a backward pumping scheme to avoid feedback³. We report a fiber gyro using a similar source, but are able to forward pump it with the use of an optical isolator. The gyro utilizes all spliced fiber components after the source fiber. Excess noise^4,5 has been an issue with fiber broadband sources due to their somewhat narrower (compared to SLD's) emission spectrum. We demonstrate an intensity noise subtraction scheme which is successful in removing most of the excess noise.

© 1992 Optical Society of America