Open AccessDemonstration of generating a 100 Gbit/s orbital-angular-momentum beam with a tunable mode order over a range of wavelengths using an integrated broadband pixel-array structure
Author(s) -
Haoqian Song,
Huibin Zhou,
Kaiheng Zou,
Runzhou Zhang,
Kai Pang,
Amir Minoofar,
Xinzhou Su,
Nanzhe Hu,
Cong Liu,
Robert Bock,
Shlomo Zach,
Moshe Tur
Publication year - 2021
Publication title -
optics letters/optics index
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.524
H-Index - 272
eISSN - 1071-2763
pISSN - 0146-9592
DOI - 10.1364/ol.435725
Subject(s) - optics , physics , algorithm , computer science
We experimentally generate an orbital-angular-momentum (OAM) beam with a tunable mode order over a range of wavelengths utilizing an integrated broadband pixel-array OAM emitter. The emitter is composed of a 3-to-4 coupler, four phase controllers, and a mode convertor. An optical input is split into four waveguides by the coupler. Subsequently, the four waveguide fields are coherently combined and transformed into a free-space OAM beam by the mode convertor. By tuning the phase delay Δ φ between the four waveguides using the integrated phase controllers, the OAM order of the generated beam could be changed. Our results show that (a) a single OAM beam with a tunable OAM order ( ℓ =-1 or ℓ =+1) is generated with the intermodal power coupling of <-11 d B , and (b) in a wavelength range of 6.4 nm, a free-space link of a single 50 Gbaud quadrature-phase-shift-keying (QPSK) channel carried by the tunable OAM beam is achieved with a bit error rate below the forward-error-correction threshold. As proof of concept, a 400 Gbit/s OAM-multiplexed and WDM QPSK link is demonstrated with a ∼1-dB OSNR penalty compared with a single-beam link.