Published papers

In this Letter, we report phase-matched four-wave mixing separated by over one octave in a dispersion-engineered crystalline microresonator. Experimental and numerical results presented here confirm that primary sidebands were generated with a frequency shift up to 140 THz, and that secondary sidebands formed a localized comb structure, known as a clustered comb in the vicinity of the primary sidebands. A theoretical analysis of the phase-matching condition validated our experimental observations, and our results agree well with numerical simulations. These results offer the potential to realize a frequency-tunable comb cluster generator operating from 1 μm to mid-infrared wavelengths with a single and compact device.

A high-Q silica whispering gallery mode microresonator is an attractive platform on which to demonstrate a broad and phase-locked Raman comb in various wavelength regimes. Raman combs can be used for applications such as compact pulse laser sources, sensors, optical clocks, and coherence tomography. However, the formation dynamics of a Raman comb has not been well exploited. Here we study the dynamics of the Raman comb formation in silica rod microresonators, which have cavity-free spectral ranges in microwave rates. We generated a Raman comb with a smooth spectral envelope and also observed the transition between two Raman combs located at different center wavelengths. The transition behavior was obtained when we changed the pump detuning and the coupling strength between the microresonator and fiber. We also explain these phenomena by using a simple model based on coupled-mode equations.

We review recent trends in the generation of a frequency comb in a microresonator, which is also known as a microcomb. The review includes both its history and applications. We explain on the basics in relation to how phase-locked and soliton states are achieved. Then, issues such as the coupling with optomechanics are discussed, which reveal the rich physics involved in this system. Finally, we describe how to extend the comb generation bandwidth by using stimulated Raman scattering and third harmonic generation.

Microresonator-based optical frequency combs (known as microcombs or Kerr combs) have a large repetition frequency ranging typically from 10 to 1000 GHz, which is compatible with fast-scanning applications, including dual-comb spectroscopy and LiDAR. In this research, we numerically study dual-comb generation and soliton trapping in a single microresonator, whose two transverse modes are excited with orthogonally polarized dual pumping. The simulation model is described by using coupled Lugiato-Lefever equations (LLEs), which take account of cross-phase modulation and the difference in repetition frequencies. The numerical simulation calculates the dual-comb formation in a microresonator, whose microcombs propagate as soliton pulses and cause soliton trapping depending on the parameters. In the simulation, a trapped soliton is seeded by one of the original solitons in two transverse modes. In addition, we introduce an analytical solution for trapped solitons in coupled LLEs using a Lagrangian perturbation approach and clarify the relation between the parameters. Revealing the conditions of dual-comb soliton generation and soliton trapping is helpful in terms of optimizing the conditions for causing or avoiding these phenomena.

By using nonlinear coupled mode equations, we numerically investigated the generation of a Kerr comb in a normal dispersion microcavity system, where mode coupling between two cavity modes is present. In contrast to previous studies, our model is rigorous in which we fully considered the mode coupling between two modes. We investigated the phase matching condition to obtain the suitable parameters needed to form a free-spectral-range (FSR)-selectable comb. Our calculations are in good agreement with existing experimental results, and enable us to obtain a good understanding of the phenomenon; moreover our model also allows us to reveal new phenomena. We investigated 1-FSR comb generation in detail and found that randomly oscillating behavior will appear when detuning is scanned, which has never before been clearly observed. This modeling approach will be a powerful tool that will assist dispersion engineering for Kerr comb generation and the frequency tuning needed to generate a deterministic mode-locked comb.