Abstract

Laser diodes are not only good laser-light sources but highly efficient nonlinear elements. The mixing signal power as a function of pump frequency differences of as much as 3 THz for three- and four-color four-wave mixing configurations is investigated experimentally and theoretically. The influence of phase matching, mode-spacing dispersion, and resonance effects is described by a round-trip model yielding an effective nonlinearity from the experimental data. The values obtained are in good agreement with the theoretical results. The phase-coherent bisection of a frequency interval and heterodyne detection with a coherent local oscillator are demonstrated as examples of application of four-wave mixing in laser diodes in frequency synthesis and spectroscopy.

© 1996 Optical Society of America

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