Continuous-wave whispering-gallery optical parametric oscillator for high-resolution spectroscopy

We achieve a continuous operation of a whispering gallery optical parametric oscillator by stabilizing the resonator temperature T on the mK level and simultaneously locking the pump frequency to a cavity resonance using the Pound-Drever-Hall technique. The millimeter-sized device converts several mW of a pump wave at 1040 nm wavelength to signal and idler waves around 2000 nm wavelength with more than 50% efficiency. Over 1 h, power and frequency of the signal wave vary by < +/- 1% and by < +/- 25 MHz, respectively. The latter can be tuned over 480 MHz without a mode hop by changing T over 120 mK. In order to prove the suitability for high-resolution spectroscopy, we scan the signal frequency across the resonance of a Fabry-Perot interferometer resolving nicely its 10 MHz linewidth. (C) 2015 Optical Society of America