Discrete temporal Talbot effect in synthetic mesh lattices

We investigate the discrete temporal Talbot effect in a synthetic mesh lattice by employing two coupled fiber loops with different lengths. The lattice consists of the round-trip number and time delay of pulse trains propagating in the fiber loops. The Talbot effect occurs only as the incident pulse train in one loop has a temporal period that is 1, 2, or 4 folds of time interval corresponding to the length difference of the two loops. By varying the splitting ratio of coupler connecting the two loops, the lattice band structure can be engineered and so do the Talbot distance, which can be further tuned by imposing an initial linear phase distribution on the incident pulse train. In addition, the incident periods for Talbot effect can also be fractional fold by using time multiplexing. The study may find applications in temporal cloaking, passive amplifying, and pulse repetition rate multiplication. (C) 2018 Optical Society of America under the terms of the OSA Open Access Publishing Agreement