Fundamental scaling limits and bandwidth shaping of frequency-modulated combs

Abstract: Frequency-modulated (FM) combs based on active cavities like quantum cascade lasers have recently emerged as promising light sources in many spectral regions. Unlike passive modelocking, which uses amplitude modulation to generate amplitude modulation, FM combs use phase modulation to generate phase modulation. They can therefore be regarded as a phase-domain version of passive modelocking. However, while the ultimate scaling laws of passive modelocking have long been known -- Haus showed in 1975 that pulses have a bandwidth proportional to effective gain bandwidth -- the limits of FM combs have been much less clear. Here, we show that FM combs are governed by the same fundamental limits, producing combs whose bandwidths are linear in the effective gain bandwidth. Not only do we show theoretically that the diffusive effect of gain curvature limits comb bandwidth, we also show experimentally how this limit can be increased. By adding carefully designed resonant-loss structures that are evanescently coupled to the cavity of a terahertz laser, we reduce the curvature and increase the effective gain bandwidth of the laser, demonstrating bandwidth enhancement. Our results give a new degree of freedom for the creation of active chip-scale combs and can be applied to a wide array of cavity geometries.