On-Chip Stimulated Brillouin Scattering to Linearize a Dual-Parallel Mach-Zehnder Modulator

Abstract

Microwave photonics offers great potential for wideband systems, but link linearity remains limited and must be overcome to have the dynamic range required for many applications. Here, we propose and demonstrate the linearization of a Dual-Parallel Mach-Zehnder Modulator by frequency-selectively controlling the phase and amplitude of the carrier utilizing a dual-pump, narrowband stimulated Brillouin scattering scheme. Measurements using a single-mode fiber and chalcogenide waveguides on a chip are presented. As a result, a suppression of third-order distortion terms of 27 dB is experimentally obtained, and a spurious free dynamic range improvement of 9 dB using fiber and 4.5 dB using a chalcogenide chip, respectively. On-chip measurements enable the possibility of a fully integrated system, significantly reducing the overall footprint.