Surface acoustic wave opto-mechanical oscillator and frequency comb generator

We report on realization of an efficient triply resonant coupling between two long lived optical modes and a high frequency surface acoustic wave (SAW) mode of the same monolithic crystalline whispering gallery mode resonator. The coupling results in an opto-mechanical oscillation and generation of a monochromatic SAW. A strong nonlinear interaction of this mechanical mode with other equidistant SAW modes leads to mechanical hyperparametric oscillation and generation of a SAW pulse train and associated frequency comb in the resonator. We visualized the comb by observing the modulation of the light escaping the resonator. (C) 2011 Optical Society of America