Nondegenerate four-wave mixing in a long-cavity /spl lambda//4-shifted DFB laser using its lasing beam as pump beams

In this paper, we discuss nondegenerate four-wave mixing in a lasing long-cavity /spl lambda//4-shifted DFB laser using the laser beams as pump beams. A high conversion efficiency and wide conversion range were experimentally demonstrated without the assistance of Fabry-Perot resonance. Electric field profiles of the pump, signal, and conjugate beam in our /spl lambda//4-shifted DFB laser are discussed. The third-order nonlinear susceptibilities of InP-InGaAs MQW's are then estimated from the experimental results. We discuss the saturation characteristics and the ratio of the conjugate power to the amplified spontaneous emission. We show that /spl lambda//4-shifted DFB lasers are suitable for wavelength converters using nondegenerate four-wave mixing because of their ability to provide single-device operation.