Microwave Frequency Quadrupling Based on Distributed Feedback Laser and a Single Intensity Modulator

In this article, we have proposed and experimentally demonstrated a directly modulated distributed feedback laser (DFB-LD) to generate microwave and millimeter-wave signals. The proposed scheme uses DFB-LD and intensity modulator (IM) biased at null point. A radio frequency (RF) signal from a signal generator is split into two branches and one branch directly modulates the DFB-LD, while the other branch drives the IM. Two second-order sidebands separated by four times the frequency of the input RF signal are generated. Experimental results indicated that we can generate a four-fold microwave signal with a good optical signal to noise ratio.