[OPTICAL REVIEW Vol. 8, No. 5 (2001) 358-363]

Dynamics of Stimulated Brillouin Scattering in a Short and High-Finesse Fiber Fabry-Perot Resonator

Kazuhiko OGUSU*

Department of Electrical and Electronic Engineering, Shizuoka University, 3-5-1, Johoku, Hamamatsu, 432-8561 Japan

(Received February 20, 2001; Accepted April 26, 2001)

We theoretically investigate the dynamics of stimulated Brillouin scattering (SBS) in a short fiber Fabry-Perot resonator with reflection mirrors. The analysis is based on the coherent six-wave model including an optical Kerr effect and the linear cavity detunings for the pump and created Stokes waves are taken into account in the formulation. The instabilities including periodic, quasi-periodic and chaotic oscillations can occur owing to the Kerr effect even if the fiber resonator is so short as to ensure a single longitudinal-mode operation. The threshold power for SBS and the boundary power between the stable and unstable regions are numerically calculated as a function of the amplitude reflectance of mirrors for different cavity detunings. The dynamics of SBS and these two critical powers depend on the amplitude reflectance and the cavity detuning. Although an increase in the mirror reflectance decreases the threshold power for SBS, it may limit the utility of SBS since the stable region is narrow and the output power levels of the pump and Stokes waves are low.

Key words : stimulated Brillouin scattering, Brillouin laser, fiber, Fabry-Perot resonator, instabilities

tekogus@eng.shizuoka.ac.jp