Phase-modulator-based optoelectronic oscillator for generating short optical pulse and microwave signal

A phase-modulator-based optoelectronic oscillator (OEO) is utilized to implement a self-starting optical pulse and microwave signal source. This system is able to simultaneously generate a 9.8-GHz optical pulse stream with 141-fs (over 100 Hz to 1 MHz) timing jitter and 6.5-ps pulse width, along with a high spectral purity electrical signal that is locked to the repetition rate of the optical pulses. The measured phase noise is −112 dBc/Hz at 10 kHz away from carrier, and the side modes are perfectly suppressed.