Parametrically driven pure-Kerr dissipative solitons in a chip-integrated microcavity

Published

March 14, 2024

Author(s)

Gregory Moille, Miriam Leonhardt, David Paligora, Nicolas Englebert, Francois Leo, Julien Fatome, Kartik Srinivasan, Miro Erkintalo

Abstract

The discovery that externally-driven nonlinear optical resonators can sustain ultrashort pulses cor- responding to coherent optical frequency combs has enabled landmark advances in applications from telecommunications to sensing. The research focus has hitherto been on resonators with purely cu- bic (Kerr-type) nonlinearity that are externally-driven with a monochromatic continuous wave laser – in such systems, the solitons manifest themselves as unique attractors whose carrier frequency coincides with that of the external driving field. Recent experiments have, however, shown that a qualitatively different type of temporal soliton can arise via parametric down-conversion in res- onators with simultaneous quadratic and cubic nonlinearity. In contrast to conventional solitons in pure-Kerr resonators, these parametrically driven solitons come in two different flavours with oppo- site phases, and they are spectrally centred at half of the frequency of the driving field. Here, we theoretically predict and experimentally demonstrate that parametrically driven solitons can also arise in resonators with pure Kerr nonlinearity under conditions of bichromatic driving. In this case, the solitons arise through parametric four-wave mixing, come with two distinct phases, and have a carrier frequency in between the two external driving fields. Our experiments are performed in an on-chip silicon nitride microcavity, and we observe frequency comb spectra in good agreement with theoretical predictions. In addition to representing a fundamental discovery of a new type of temporal dissipative soliton, our results constitute the first unequivocal realisation of parametri- cally driven soliton frequency combs in a microcavity platform compatible with foundry-ready mass fabrication.

Citation

Nature Photonics

Pub Type

Journals

Download Paper

https://doi.org/10.1038/s41566-024-01401-6

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Keywords

frequency comb, nonlinear optics, parametric interaction

Citation

Moille, G. , Leonhardt, M. , Paligora, D. , Englebert, N. , Leo, F. , Fatome, J. , Srinivasan, K. and Erkintalo, M. (2024), Parametrically driven pure-Kerr dissipative solitons in a chip-integrated microcavity, Nature Photonics, [online], https://doi.org/10.1038/s41566-024-01401-6, https://tsapps.nist.gov/publication/get_pdf.cfm?pub_id=936778 (Accessed April 27, 2024)