The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document.
The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge covers the following: Patent number, Date patent was issued, Date patent was filed, Title of the patent, Applicant, Inventor, Assignee, Attorney firm, Primary examiner, Assistant examiner, CPCs, and Abstract. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document (in Adobe Acrobat format, aka pdf). To download or print any patent click here.
Patent No.:
Date of Patent:
Jul. 09, 2002
Filed:
Feb. 18, 2000
Richard L. Davis, Redondo Beach, CA (US);
TRW Inc., Redondo Beach, CA (US);
Abstract
A mode locked semiconductor laser that can generate relatively high-power output pulses. The semiconductor mode locked laser is formed from an array of optical amplifiers that are coupled to a common resonant cavity by way of an optical channelizer or wavelength division multiplexer (WDM). By utilizing an array of optical amplifiers, the output pulses will have a relatively higher power than known mode locked lasers. As such, the mode locked semiconductor laser in accordance with the present invention does not depend on the power handling capability of the individual optical amplifiers and allows the average output power to be scaled, for example, up to the kilowatt range using semiconductor optical amplifiers. A mode locked laser in accordance with the present invention can be implemented with active mode locking, passive mode locking or a hybrid of the two. In embodiments utilizing active mode locking, the output pulse shape can be tailored by the amplifier drive current distribution.