Highly efficient four wave mixing in GaInP photonic crystal waveguides

We report highly efficient four wave mixing in a GaInP photonic crystal waveguide. Owing to its large bandgap, the ultrafast Kerr nonlinearity of GaInP is not diminished by two photon absorption and related carrier effects for photons in the 1550 nm range. A four-wave-mixing efficiency of -49 dB was demonstrated for cw pump and probe signals in the milliwatt range, while for pulsed pumps with a peak power of 25 mW the conversion efficiency increased to -36 dB. Measured conversion efficiency dependencies on pump probe detuning and on pump power are in excellent agreement with a simple analytical model from which the nonlinear parameter gamma is extracted. gamma scales approximately with the square of the slow down factor and varies from 800 W(-1)m(-1) at a pump wavelength lambda(p) = 1532 nm to 2900 W(-1)m(-1) at lambda(p)=1550 nm. These values are consistent with those obtained from self phase modulation experiments in similar devices. (C) 2010 Optical Society of America