Generation of higher degree chaos by controlling harmonics of the modulating signal in EDFRL

Abstract Erbium doped fiber ring lasers (EDFRL) are being used to generate optical chaos for secure communication by modulating the cavity loss/pump power or exploiting nonlinearities. The security level in chaotic communication depends on degree of chaos quantified by the Lyapunov exponent and its variability which is determined by the number of tuneable system parameters which were limited to five main parameters, i.e. modulation index, modulation frequency, pump power, cavity gain and loss. In this study we have increased the number of tuneable parameters using square, triangular and sum of harmonics waveforms. We have analysed the effect on degree of chaos of phase and duty cycle of square modulating signal with gradual addition of harmonics. For the given cavity parameters, the Lyapunov exponents can be increased by more than fifteen times using square wave modulating signal and a duty cycle of 60%. The electrical parameters identified make generation of new chaotic sequences more flexible in a field deployed EDFRL chaotic system.