29,633 research outputs found
A tunable cavity-locked diode laser source for terahertz photomixing
An all solid-state approach to the precise frequency synthesis and control of widely tunable terahertz radiation by differencing continuous-wave diode lasers at 850 nm is reported in this paper. The difference frequency is synthesized by three fiber-coupled external-cavity laser diodes. Two of the lasers are Pound-Drever-Hall locked to different orders of a Fabry-Perot (FP) cavity, and the third is offset-frequency locked to the second of the cavity-locked lasers using a tunable microwave oscillator. The first cavity-locked laser and the offset-locked laser produce the difference frequency, whose value is accurately determined by the sum of an integer multiple of the free spectral range of the FP cavity and the offset frequency. The dual-frequency 850-nm output of the three laser system is amplified to 500 mW through two-frequency injection seeding of a single semiconductor tapered optical amplifier. As proof of precision frequency synthesis and control of tunability, the difference frequency is converted into a terahertz wave by optical-heterodyne photomixing in low-temperature-grown GaAs and used for the spectroscopy of simple molecules. The 3-dB spectral power bandwidth of the terahertz radiation is routinely observed to be ≾1 MHz. A simple, but highly accurate, method of obtaining an absolute frequency calibration is proposed and an absolute calibration of 10^(-7) demonstrated using the known frequencies of carbon monoxide lines between 0.23-1.27 THz
A widely tunable 10-m quantum cascade laser phase-locked to a state-of-the-art mid-infrared reference for precision molecular spectroscopy
We report the coherent phase-locking of a quantum cascade laser (QCL) at
10-m to the secondary frequency standard of this spectral region, a CO2
laser stabilized on a saturated absorption line of OsO4. The stability and
accuracy of the standard are transferred to the QCL resulting in a line width
of the order of 10 Hz, and leading to our knowledge to the narrowest QCL to
date. The locked QCL is then used to perform absorption spectroscopy spanning 6
GHz of NH3 and methyltrioxorhenium, two species of interest for applications in
precision measurements.Comment: 5 pages, 4 figure
Narrow-line phase-locked quantum cascade laser in the 9.2 micron range
We report on the operation of a 50 mW continuous wave quantum cascade laser
(QCL) in the 9.2 micrometer range, phase locked to a single mode CO2 laser with
a tunable frequency offset. The wide free running emission spectrum of the QCL
(3-5 MHz) is strongly narrowed down to the kHz range making it suitable for
high resolution molecular spectroscopy.Comment: 4 page
An Ultra-Stable Referenced Interrogation System in the Deep Ultraviolet for a Mercury Optical Lattice Clock
We have developed an ultra-stable source in the deep ultraviolet, suitable to
fulfill the interrogation requirements of a future fully-operational lattice
clock based on neutral mercury. At the core of the system is a Fabry-P\'erot
cavity which is highly impervious to temperature and vibrational perturbations.
The mirror substrate is made of fused silica in order to exploit the
comparatively low thermal noise limits associated with this material. By
stabilizing the frequency of a 1062.6 nm Yb-doped fiber laser to the cavity,
and including an additional link to LNE-SYRTE's fountain primary frequency
standards via an optical frequency comb, we produce a signal which is both
stable at the 1E-15 level in fractional terms and referenced to primary
frequency standards. The signal is subsequently amplified and frequency-doubled
twice to produce several milliwatts of interrogation signal at 265.6 nm in the
deep ultraviolet.Comment: 7 pages, 6 figure
Quantum phases of a Feshbach-resonant atomic Bose gas in one dimension
We study an atomic Bose gas with an s-wave Feshbach resonance in a
one-dimensional optical lattice, with the densities of atoms and molecules
incommensurate with the lattice. At zero temperature, most of the parameter
region is occupied by a phase in which the superfluid fluctuations of atoms and
molecules are the predominant ones, due to the phase fluctuations of atoms and
molecules being locked by a Josephson coupling between them. When the density
difference between atoms and molecules is commensurate with the lattice, two
additional phases may exist: the two component Luttinger liquid where both the
atomic and molecular sectors are gapless, and the inter-channel charge density
wave where the relative density fluctuations between atoms and molecules are
frozen at low energy.Comment: 4+epsilon pages, 3 figures; references adde
Robust, frequency-stable and accurate mid-IR laser spectrometer based on frequency comb metrology of quantum cascade lasers up-converted in orientation-patterned GaAs
We demonstrate a robust and simple method for measurement, stabilization and
tuning of the frequency of cw mid-infrared (MIR) lasers, in particular of
quantum cascade lasers. The proof of principle is performed with a quantum
cascade laser at 5.4 \mu m, which is upconverted to 1.2 \mu m by sum-frequency
generation in orientation-patterned GaAs with the output of a standard
high-power cw 1.5 \mu m fiber laser. Both the 1.2 \mu m and the 1.5 \mu m waves
are measured by a standard Er:fiber frequency comb. Frequency measurement at
the 100 kHz-level, stabilization to sub-10 kHz level, controlled frequency
tuning and long-term stability are demonstrated
An Integrated-Photonics Optical-Frequency Synthesizer
Integrated-photonics microchips now enable a range of advanced
functionalities for high-coherence applications such as data transmission,
highly optimized physical sensors, and harnessing quantum states, but with
cost, efficiency, and portability much beyond tabletop experiments. Through
high-volume semiconductor processing built around advanced materials there
exists an opportunity for integrated devices to impact applications cutting
across disciplines of basic science and technology. Here we show how to
synthesize the absolute frequency of a lightwave signal, using integrated
photonics to implement lasers, system interconnects, and nonlinear frequency
comb generation. The laser frequency output of our synthesizer is programmed by
a microwave clock across 4 THz near 1550 nm with 1 Hz resolution and
traceability to the SI second. This is accomplished with a heterogeneously
integrated III/V-Si tunable laser, which is guided by dual
dissipative-Kerr-soliton frequency combs fabricated on silicon chips. Through
out-of-loop measurements of the phase-coherent, microwave-to-optical link, we
verify that the fractional-frequency instability of the integrated photonics
synthesizer matches the reference-clock instability for a 1
second acquisition, and constrain any synthesis error to while
stepping the synthesizer across the telecommunication C band. Any application
of an optical frequency source would be enabled by the precision optical
synthesis presented here. Building on the ubiquitous capability in the
microwave domain, our results demonstrate a first path to synthesis with
integrated photonics, leveraging low-cost, low-power, and compact features that
will be critical for its widespread use.Comment: 10 pages, 6 figure
Inhibition of translation initiation complex formation by GE81112 unravels a 16S rRNA structural switch involved in P-site decoding
In prokaryotic systems, the initiation phase of protein synthesis is governed by the presence of initiation factors that guide the transition of the small ribosomal subunit (30S) from an unlocked preinitiation complex (30S preIC) to a locked initiation complex (30SIC) upon the formation of a correct codon-anticodon interaction in the peptidyl (P) site. Biochemical and structural characterization of GE81112, a translational inhibitor specific for the initiation phase, indicates that the main mechanism of action of this antibiotic is to prevent P-site decoding by stabilizing the anticodon stem loop of the initiator tRNA in a distorted conformation. This distortion stalls initiation in the unlocked 30S preIC state characterized by tighter IF3 binding and a reduced association rate for the 50S subunit. At the structural level we observe that in the presence of GE81112 the h44/h45/h24a interface, which is part of the IF3 binding site and forms ribosomal intersubunit bridges, preferentially adopts a disengaged conformation. Accordingly, the findings reveal that the dynamic equilibrium between the disengaged and engaged conformations of the h44/h45/h24a interface regulates the progression of protein synthesis, acting as a molecular switch that senses and couples the 30S P-site decoding step of translation initiation to the transition from an unlocked preIC to a locked 30SIC state
Vernier spectrometer using counter-propagating soliton microcombs
Acquisition of laser frequency with high resolution under continuous and
abrupt tuning conditions is important for sensing, spectroscopy and
communications. Here, a single microresonator provides rapid and broad-band
measurement of frequencies across the optical C-band with a relative frequency
precision comparable to conventional dual frequency comb systems. Dual-locked
counter-propagating solitons having slightly different repetition rates are
used to implement a Vernier spectrometer. Laser tuning rates as high as 10
THz/s, broadly step-tuned lasers, multi-line laser spectra and also molecular
absorption lines are characterized using the device. Besides providing a
considerable technical simplification through the dual-locked solitons and
enhanced capability for measurement of arbitrarily tuned sources, this work
reveals possibilities for chip-scale spectrometers that greatly exceed the
performance of table-top grating and interferometer-based devices
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