Brillouin induced self-heterodyne technique for narrow line width measurement

A novel technique is introduced for jitter-insensitive sub-KHz resolution linewidth characterization technique in ultra-narrow lasers for optical communication applications. The technique is based on self-heterodyne detection induced by Stimulated Brillouin Scattering (SBS). Non linear SBS drives the heterodyne mixing through optical frequency locking of a narrow tunable laser source and the signal under test, which is modulated in the low frequency range. Due to SBS nature, jitter variations in the optical frequency do not affect the correlation spectra measured with resolution figures up to 300 Hz, without the need for optical delay line as in conventional homodyne correlation techniques. (C) 2010 Optical Society of America.