Journal of Nonlinear Optical Physics & Materials
OPTICAL BISTABILITY IN A NONLINEAR SOA-BASED FIBER RING RESONATOR
Pablo A. Costanzo‐Caso, Yiye Jin, Sergio Granieri, Azad Z. Siahmakoun
Abstract
A novel optical inverted bistable switch based on a nonlinear fiber ring resonator (FRR) containing a semiconductor optical amplifier (SOA) has been analyzed and experimentally demonstrated. Optical bistability is obtained due to the transmission characteristics of the resonator and the SOA's gain characteristics. A complete theoretical analysis and supporting simulations are presented. A prototype is demonstrated using commercial optical components. Experimental results show switching performance with falling times lower than 10 ns.