168 channels x 6 GHz from a multiwavelength mode-locked semiconductor laser

A gain-flattened multiwavelength mode-locked semiconductor laser generates 168 discrete wavelength channels at 6 GHz. Intracavity etalon filtering delineates the 0.12-nm-spaced channels while spatial filtering inside a spectrometer broadens the laser spectrum to 20 nm. Mode locking produces 85-ps pulses in each channel at 750 MHz. The pulse-repetition rate is multiplied to 6 GHz per channel via optical time-division multiplexing to yield an aggregate pulse rate of 1 THz.