Abstract

A method of all-optical microwave mixing and bandpass filtering is proposed to achieve idler-free RF frequency conversion based on cascaded phase modulation of a broadband optical source. The variable optical carrier time-shift method is employed to selectively generate the desired RF mixing components and highly suppress the other idler frequencies. An experimental system that can perform idler-free fundamental and harmonic RF upconversions is demonstrated, and the conversion efficiency is investigated both theoretically and experimentally.

©2012 Optical Society of America

Idler-free microwave photonic mixer integrated with a widely tunable and highly selective microwave photonic filter

Dan Zou, Xiaoping Zheng, Shangyuan Li, Hanyi Zhang, and Bingkun Zhou
Opt. Lett. 39(13) 3954-3957 (2014)

All-optical microwave bandpass filter and phase shifter using a broadband optical source and an optical phase modulator

Xiaoxiao Xue, Xiaoping Zheng, Hanyi Zhang, and Bingkun Zhou
Opt. Lett. 37(10) 1661-1663 (2012)

Widely tunable single-bandpass microwave photonic filter based on polarization processing of a nonsliced broadband optical source

Hui Wang, Jian Yu Zheng, Wei Li, Li Xian Wang, Ming Li, Liang Xie, and Ning Hua Zhu
Opt. Lett. 38(22) 4857-4860 (2013)

Microwave photonic phase-tunable mixer

Tianwei Jiang, Ruihuan Wu, Song Yu, Dongsheng Wang, and Wanyi Gu
Opt. Express 25(4) 4519-4527 (2017)

Silicon slow-light-based photonic mixer for microwave-frequency conversion applications

A. M. Gutiérrez, A. Brimont, J. Herrera, M. Aamer, J. Martí, D. J. Thomson, F. Y. Gardes, G. T. Reed, J. M. Fedeli, and P. Sanchis
Opt. Lett. 37(10) 1721-1723 (2012)