A coupled optoelectronic oscillator with three resonant cavities

A new single-mode optoelectronic oscillator (OEO) with three coupled cavities is proposed and demonstrated. A Fabry-Perot (F-P) cavity fiber laser and an optical-electrical feedback branch are coupled together to construct an optoelectronic oscillator, where the F-P cavity fiber laser serves as a light source, and a modulator is placed in the laser cavity to implement reciprocating modulation, which simultaneously splits the laser cavity into two parts and forms a dual-loop configuration. To complete an optoelectronic oscillator, part of optical signal is output from the F-P cavity to implement the feedback modulation, which constructs the third cavity. Since only the oscillation signal satisfies the requirements of all the three cavities, a single-mode oscillation can be finally achieved. Three resonant cavities are successfully designed without adding more optoelectronic devices, and the side-modes can be well suppressed with low cost. The oscillation condition is theoretically analyzed. In the experimental demonstration, a 20 GHz single longitudinal mode microwave signal is successfully obtained.