DETERMINISM AND STOCHASTICITY OF POWER-DROPOUT EVENTS IN SEMICONDUCTOR-LASERS WITH OPTICAL FEEDBACK

Semiconductor lasers with optical feedback can display sudden power-dropout events at irregular time intervals. We show numerically that, in some parameter regimes, spontaneous emission noise qualitatively influences the nature and statistics of the dropouts. Experimental measurements of the mean time between dropout events and its dependence on feedback strength agree well with analytic predictions made by Henry and Kazarinov [IEEE J. Quantum Electron. QE-22, 294 (1986)] based on the assumption that spontaneous emission noise induces these dropout events. (C) 1995 Optical Society of America