Traveling Wave Model for Frequency Comb Generation in Single-Section Quantum Well Diode Lasers

We present a traveling wave model for a semiconductor diode laser based on quantum wells. The gain model is carefully derived from first principles and implemented with as few phenomenological constants as possible. The transverse energies of the quantum well confined electrons are discretized to automatically capture the effects of spectral and spatial hole burning, the gain asymmetry, and the linewidth enhancement factor. We apply this model to semiconductor optical amplifiers and single-section phase-locked lasers. We are able to reproduce the experimental results. The calculated frequency modulated comb shows potential to be a compact, chip-scale comb source without additional external components.