POLARIZATION PROPERTIES OF 4-WAVE-MIXING IN STRAINED SEMICONDUCTOR OPTICAL AMPLIFIERS

We present a theoretical and experimental study of the polarization pr operties of the four-wave mixing susceptibility of highly-strained mul tiquantum-well optical amplifiers and show how the intensity and polar ization of the four-wave mixing signal depend on the polarization of t he input waves. We demonstrate the validity of our model by generating a wavelength-converted signal having a polarization orthogonal to tha t of the pump wave at the output of the amplifier, In addition, we dis cuss the possibility of making the conversion efficiency independent o f the input signal polarization by proper selection of the pump polari zation.