WIDELY TUNABLE SPECTRUM TRANSLATION AND WAVELENGTH EXCHANGE BY 4-WAVE-MIXING IN OPTICAL FIBERS

By a suitable choice of the wavelengths of two pumps and one signal ab out the zero-dispersion wavelength of a fiber, it is possible to gener ate mainly one four-wave-mixing product (idler) whose spectrum is a tr anslated version of that of the signal; no spectral inversion or phase conjugation is involved. Unit conversion efficiency can in principle be obtained. Complete exchange of power between two wavelengths can he implemented. One can adjust the wavelengths of the signal and the idl er at will over tens of nanometers, while maintaining high conversion efficiency, by suitably tuning the pumps. For fixed pump wavelengths, the signal bandwidth scales linearly with pump power and can reach sev eral nanometers for pump powers of the order of several watts in silic a fibers or less in highly nonlinear fibers. (C) 1996 Optical Society of America