Wavelength-Tunable and Bandwidth-Variable Ultra-Flat Optical Frequency Comb Block Generation From a Bismuth-Based Actively Mode-Locked Fiber Laser

We generate, for the first time and to the best of our knowledge, a tunable ultra-flat optical frequency comb (OFC) block from a 10-GHz bismuth-based actively mode-locked fiber laser. A bismuth-based erbium-doped fiber (Bi-EDF) with a length of 1.5 m and a bismuth-based highly nonlinear fiber (Bi-HNLF) with a length of 4.1 m are used as a gain medium and a spectral broadening device, respectively. We also employ a wavelength-tunable and bandwidth-variable optical filter for an intracavity filter. The center wavelength of the OFC output can be widely tuned from 1535 to 1585 nm because the Bi-EDF has a broadband gain profile. A spectrally broadened ultra-flat OFC is successfully generated by the self-phase modulation in the Bi-HNLF. By tuning the filter bandwidth, the 10-dB spectral width and the pulsewidth of the generated OFC can be widely varied from 0.23 to 2.4 nm and from 3 to 20.1 ps, respectively. The fiber ring cavity is as short as 17.8 m. For the entire tuning ranges, the proposed bismuth-based tunable ultra-flat OFC generator also realizes stable bit-error-free mode-locking operation.