All-optical amplification via the interaction among guided and leaky propagation modes in lithium niobate waveguides exploiting the cascaded second-order nonlinearity

The aim of this paper consists of performing a theoretical investigation of an all-optical amplifier and discussing the problems for a realistic implementation. An original periodically poled lithium niobate channel waveguide, having the optical c-axis opportunely oriented on the xz plane was considered. The waveguiding structure, designed to operate in the second communication window of optical fibers, shows versatile properties as was theoretically demonstrated. In fact, it enables both the selection and the coupling strength of four different propagation modes, two guided and two leaky, interacting via the cascaded second-order nonlinearity. The coupling among guided and leaky modes is obtained by means of two different techniques: (i) birefringence phase-matching (BPM) via a suitable orientation of the optical c-axis crystal on the xz plane and (ii) quasi-phase-matching by periodical inversion of the lithium niobate ferroelectric domains. A strong diffusion of magnesium in the region external to the periodically poled waveguiding channel is needed in order to achieve the suitable BPM and to maximize the bounding of the electromagnetic field and, thus, the overlapping integrals. Finally, a powerful refinement of device operation via the use of the seeded second harmonic waves is proposed. Gains of the order of 20 dB are achieved with reduced bias powers. The order of magnitude of the bias power decreases, with respect to the unseeded second harmonic operation, from 145 to 32 W.