Reconfigurable symmetric pulses generation using on-chip cascaded optical differentiators.

We report a type of programmable pulse shaping method based on cascaded frequency-detuned optical differentiators. By properly adjusting the central wavelength of each differentiator, a large variety of symmetric pulses can be generated from a transform-limited Gaussian-like pulse. We numerically and experimentally demonstrate the generation of flat-top, parabolic and triangular pulses with tunable pulse widths from a 20-ps Gaussian-like pulse, using no more than three cascaded differentiators. It can be found that as more differentiators are used, higher synthesized accuracy and larger tuning range of pulse widths can be obtained in general. Additionally, in our experiment, we design and fabricate thermally tunable delay interferometers on the silicon-on-insulator (SOI) platform to work as optical differentiators, which can help us realize the shaping system with small footprint (943μm × 395μm) and high stability.