Two-octave spanning supercontinuum generation in stoichiometric silicon nitride waveguides pumped at telecom wavelengths

We demonstrate supercontinuum generation in stoichiometric silicon nitride (Si3N4 in SiO2) integrated optical waveguides, pumped at telecommunication wavelengths. The pump laser is a mode-locked erbium fiber laser at a wavelength of 1.56 μm with a pulse duration of 120 fs. With a waveguide-internal pulse energy of 1.4 nJ and a waveguide with 1.0 μm x 0.9 μm cross section, designed for anomalous dispersion across the 1500 nm telecommunication range, the output spectrum extends from the visible, at around 526 nm, up to the mid-infrared, at least to 2.6 μm, the instrumental limit of our detection. This output spans more than 2.2 octaves (454 THz at the -30 dB level). The measured output spectra agree well with theoretical modeling based on the generalized nonlinear Schrödinger equation. The infrared part of the supercontinuum spectra shifts progressively towards the mid-infrared, well beyond 2.6 μm, by increasing the width of the waveguides. c © 2017 Optical Society of America OCIS codes: (130.0130) Integrated optics; (190.4390) Nonlinear optics, integrated optics; (320.6629) Supercontinuum generation; (190.7110) Ultrafast nonlinear optics. References and links 1. J. M. Dudley, G. Genty, and S. Coen, “Supercontinuum generation in photonic crystal fiber,” Rev. Mod. Phys. 78, 1135–1184 (2006). 2. D. J. Jones, S. A. Diddams, J. K. Ranka, A. Stentz, R. S. Windeler, J. L. Hall, and S. T. Cundiff, “Carrier-Envelope Phase Control of Femtosecond Mode-Locked Lasers and Direct Optical Frequency Synthesis,” Science 288, 635–639 (2000). 3. A. Ruehl, M. J. Martin, K. C. Cossel, L. Chen, H. McKay, B. Thomas, C. Benko, L. Dong, J. M. Dudley, M. E. Fermann, I. Hartl, and J. Ye, “Ultrabroadband coherent supercontinuum frequency comb,” Phys. Rev. A 84, 011806 (2011). 4. H. Kano and H. Hamaguchi, “Characterization of a supercontinuum generated from a photonic crystal fiber and its application to coherent Raman spectroscopy,” Opt. Lett. 28, 2360–2362 (2003). 5. G. Humbert, W. Wadsworth, S. Leon-Saval, J. Knight, T. Birks, P. St. J. Russell, M. Lederer, D. Kopf, K. Wiesauer, E. Breuer, and D. Stifter, “Supercontinuum generation system for optical coherence tomography based on tapered photonic crystal fibre,” Opt. Express 14, 1596–1603 (2006). 6. J. T. Woodward, A. W. Smith, C. A. Jenkins, C. Lin, S. W. Brown, and K. R. Lykke, “Supercontinuum sources for metrology,” Metrologia 46, S277–S282 (2009). Vol. 25, No. 2 | 23 Jan 2017 | OPTICS EXPRESS 1542 #281693 Journal © 2017 http://dx.doi.org/10.1364/OE.25.001542 Received 28 Nov 2016; revised 6 Jan 2017; accepted 8 Jan 2017; published 19 Jan 2017 7. G. Ycas, S. Osterman, and S. A. Diddams, “Generation of a 660–2100 nm laser frequency comb based on an erbium fiber laser,” Opt. Lett. 37, 2199–2201 (2012). 8. V. Brasch, T. Herr, M. Geiselmann, G. Lihachev, M. H. P. Pfeiffer, M. L. Gorodetsky, and T. J. Kippenberg, “Photonic chip based optical frequency comb using soliton induced Cherenkov radiation,” Science 351, 357–360 (2016). 9. V. Torres-Company and A. M. Weiner, “Optical frequency comb technology for ultra-broadband radio-frequency photonics,” Laser Photonics Rev. 8, 368–393 (2014). 10. T. G. Nguyen, M. Shoeiby, S. T. Chu, B. E. Little, R. Morandotti, A. Mitchell, and D. J. Moss, “Integrated frequency comb source based Hilbert transformer for wideband microwave photonic phase analysis,” Opt. Express 23, 22087– 22097 (2015). 11. K.L. Corwin, N.R. Newbury, J.M. Dudley, S. Coen, S.A. Diddams, K. Weber, and R.S. Windeler, “Fundamental Noise Limitations to Supercontinuum Generation in Microstructure Fiber,” Phys. Rev. Lett. 90, 113904 (2003). 12. B. Kuyken, F. Leo, S. Clemmen, U. Dave, R. Van Laer, T. Ideguchi, H. Zhao, X. Liu, J. Safioui, S. Coen, S.P. Gorza, S.K. Selvaraja, S. Massar, R.M. Osgood Jr., P. Verheyen, J. Van Campenhout, R. Baets, W.M.J. Green, G. Roelkens, “Nonlinear optical interactions in silicon waveguides,” Nanophotonics 5, 1–16 (2016). 13. C. Ciret and S-P. Gorza, “Generation of ultra broadband coherent supercontinuum in tapered and dispersion managed silicon nanophotonic waveguides,” arXiv:1610.05665 [physics.optics] (2016). 14. H. Hu, W. Li, N.K. Dutta, “Dispersion-engineered tapered planar waveguide for coherent supercontinuum generation,” Opt. Commun. 324, 252–257 (2014). 15. D. Y. Oh, D. Sell, H. Lee, K. Y. Yang, S. A. Diddams, and K. J. Vahala, “Supercontinuum generation in an on-chip silica waveguide,” Opt. Lett. 39, 1046–1048 (2014). 16. D. Duchesne, M. Peccianti, M. R. E. Lamont, M. Ferrera, L. Razzari, F. Légaré, R. Morandotti, S. Chu, B. E. Little, and D. J. Moss, “Supercontinuum generation in a high index doped silica glass spiral waveguide,” Opt. Express 18, 923–930 (2010). 17. R. Halir, Y. Okawachi, J. S. Levy, M. A. Foster, M. Lipson, and A. L. Gaeta, “Ultrabroadband supercontinuum generation in a CMOS-compatible platform,” Opt. Lett. 37, 1685–1687 (2012). 18. J. M. Chavez Boggio, D. Bodenmüller, T. Fremberg, R. Haynes, M. M. Roth, R. Eisermann, M. Lisker, L. Zimmermann, and M. Böhm, “Dispersion engineered silicon nitride waveguides by geometrical and refractive-index optimization,” J. Opt. Soc. Am. B 31, 2846–2857 (2014). 19. M. R. Lamont, B. Luther-Davies, D.-Y. Choi, S. Madden, and B. J. Eggleton, “Supercontinuum generation in dispersion engineered highly nonlinear (γ = 10 /W/m) As2S3 chalcogenide planar waveguide,” Opt. Express 16, 14938–14944 (2008). 20. Y. Yu, X. Gai, P. Ma, D.-Y. Choi, Z. Yang, R. Wang, S. Debbarma, S. J. Madden, and B. Luther-Davies, “A broadband, quasi-continuous, mid-infrared supercontinuum generated in a chalcogenide glass waveguide,” Laser Photonics Rev. 8, 792–798 (2014). 21. F. Leo, S.-P. Gorza, J. Safioui, P. Kockaert, S. Coen, U. Dave, B. Kuyken, and G. Roelkens, “Dispersive wave emission and supercontinuum generation in a silicon wire waveguide pumped around the 1550 nm telecommunication wavelength,” Opt. Lett. 39, 3623–3626 (2014). 22. R. K. W. Lau, M. R. E. Lamont, A. G. Griffith, Y. Okawachi, M. Lipson, and A. L. Gaeta, “Octave-spanning mid-infrared supercontinuum generation in silicon nanowaveguides,” Opt. Lett. 39, 4518–4521 (2014). 23. B. Kuyken, T. Ideguchi, S. Holzner, M. Yan, T. W. Hänsch, J. Van Campenhout, P. Verheyen, S. Coen, F. Leo, R. Baets, G. Roelkens, and N. Picqué, “An octave-spanning mid-infrared frequency comb generated in a silicon nanophotonic wire waveguide,” Nat. Commun. 6, 6310 (2015). 24. X. Liu, M. Pu, B. Zhou, C. J. Krückel, A. Fülöp, V. Torres-Company, and M. Bache, “Octave-spanning supercontinuum generation in a silicon-rich nitride waveguide,” Opt. Lett. 41, 2719–2722 (2016). 25. F. Morichetti, A. Melloni, M. Martinelli, R. Heideman, A. Leinse, D. Geuzebroek, and A. Borremann, “Box-shaped dielectric waveguides: A new concept in integrated optics?” J. Lightwave Technol. 25, 2579–2589 (2007). 26. R. G. H. Kerstin Wörhoff, “TriPleX: A versatile dielectric photonic platform,” Adv. Opt. Techn. 4, 189–207 (2015). 27. R. M. Oldenbeuving, E. J. Klein, H. L. Offerhaus, C. J. Lee, H. Song, and K.-J. Boller, “25 kHz narrow spectral bandwidth of a wavelength tunable diode laser with a short waveguide-based external cavity,” Laser Phys. Lett. 10, 015804 (2013). 28. Y. Fan, R. M. Oldenbeuving, E. J. Klein, C. J. Lee, H. Song, M. R. H. Khan, H. L. Offerhaus, P. J. M. van der Slot, and K.-J. Boller, “A hybrid semiconductor-glass waveguide laser,” Proc. SPIE 9135, 91351 (2014). 29. A. Gondarenko, J. S. Levy, and M. Lipson, “High confinement micron-scale silicon nitride high Q ring resonator,” Opt. Express 17, 11366–11370 (2009). 30. J. F. Bauters, M. J. R. Heck, D. John, D. Dai, M.-C. Tien, J. S. Barton, A. Leinse, R. G. Heideman, D. J. Blumenthal, and J. E. Bowers, “Ultra-low-loss high-aspect-ratio Si3N4 waveguides,” Opt. Express 19, 3163-3174 (2011). 31. C. Xiong, X. Zhang, A. Mahendra, J. He, D.-Y. Choi, J. Chae, D. Marpaung, A. Leinse, R. G. Heideman, M. Hoekman, C. G. H. Roeloffzen, R. M. Oldenbeuving, P. W. L. van Dijk, C. Taddei, P. H. W. Leong, and B. J. Eggleton, “Compact and reconfigurable silicon nitride time-bin entanglement circuit,” Optica 2, 724–727 (2015). 32. L. Zhuang, D. Marpaung, M. Burla, W. Beeker, A. Leinse, and C. Roeloffzen, “Low-loss, high-index-contrast Si3N4/SiO2 optical waveguides for optical delay lines in microwave photonics signal processing,” Opt. Express 19, 23162–23170 (2011). 33. C. G. H. Roeloffzen, L. Zhuang, C. Taddei, A. Leinse, R. G. Heideman, P. W. L. van Dijk, R. M. Oldenbeuving, Vol. 25, No. 2 | 23 Jan 2017 | OPTICS EXPRESS 1543