Four-wave mixing analysis of quantum dot semiconductor lasers for linewidth enhancement factor extraction

We apply a four-wave mixing analysis on a quantum dot laser to simultaneously obtain the linewidth enhancement factor α and other intrinsic laser parameters. By fitting the experimentally obtained regenerative signals and power spectra at different detuning frequencies with the respective curves analytically calculated from the rate equations, parameters including the linewidth enhancement factor, the carrier decay rate in the dots, the differential gain, and the photon decay rate can be determined all at once under the same operating conditions. In this paper, a theoretical model for the four-wave mixing analysis of the QD lasers is derived and verified. The sensitivity and accuracy of the parameter extraction using the four-wave mixing method are presented. Moreover, how each each parameters alter the shapes of the regenerative signals and the power spectra are also discussed.