Abstract
The parametric characterization of a nonreturn-to-zero
(NRZ) to return-to-zero (RZ) data format converter based on the external optical
NRZ injection of a TO-46-can packaged vertical-cavity surface-emitting laser
(VCSEL) directly modulated by a 10 GHz electrical pulse is demonstrated. The
electrical-pulse modulation induced gain switching of the VCSEL is initiated
under external optical NRZ data injection that increases the relaxation oscillation
frequency of the homemade VCSEL from 2.2 to 7.4 GHz, thereby enabling its
electrical modulation bandwidth up to 10 GHz. The external NRZ injection reduces
the lasing threshold and enlarges the modulation depth of the VCSEL so that
the converted RZ data pulsewidth can be shortened to 27 ps with a slightly
increased peak-to-peak negative frequency chirp of 4.3 GHz (corresponding
to a chirp parameter of 122 MHz/ps). The chirp and bit error rate (BER) display
strong correlations with the injection power and the biased current of the
VCSEL. With external injection, the receiving power required for achieving
a BER below $10^{{-}9}$ at 10 Gbit/s is ${-}19.5$ dBm, and a power penalty of 16dB is observed
when the dc bias of the electrical-pulse modulated VCSEL is decreased by only
10% from the threshold condition.
© 2010 IEEE
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