Generation of transform limited optical pulses using all-optical gate

Abstract

Transform limited optical pulses have been generated using an all-optical gate based on an optical fibre Sagnac loop in which optically amplified, spectrally chirped, gain switched pulses from a DFB laser diode were used to ‘gate’ a DFB laser diode driven CW. The resulting pulses were measured to be transform limited and are therefore suitable for transmission as solitons.