Laser & Infrared, Volume. 55, Issue 1, 18(2025)
Design of digital drive circuit for vertical cavity surface emitting lasers
Vertical Cavity Surface Emitting Laser (VCSEL) is the critical component of optical quantum instruments including atomic magnetometers and atomic clocks. The stability of the VCSEL's output laser significantly impacts key parameters, such as the measurement accuracy and sensitivity of these instruments. This paper introduces a VCSEL digital drive circuit with ZYNQ7010 FPGA as a controller, which uses the XTR111 chip to supply the high-stability current required by the VCSEL, and controls the semiconductor cooler (TEC) integrated inside the VCSEL to realize high-precision temperature control through the MAX1978 chip. The experimental result shows that the designed drive circuit can output linearly adjustable current range from 0 mA to 2 mA, with an adjustment accuracy better than 0.04 mA. Additionally, the temperature control accuracy of the TEC is better than 0.1 ℃. Finally, at a driving current of 1.325 mA and an operating temperature of 63 ℃, the VCSEL exhibits minimal drift, with the maximum output power and wavelength drifts measuring 0.001 mW and 0.004 nm, respectively. This digital drive circuit meets the requirements of light source driving for high-precision measuring instruments such as atomic magnetometers.
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WEI Ying-ze, LIAO Ying, ZHOU Jian-bin, TONG Xin, YE Fan, LI Song-song, LUO Peng-kui, LI Rong-feng. Design of digital drive circuit for vertical cavity surface emitting lasers[J]. Laser & Infrared, 2025, 55(1): 18
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Received: Apr. 16, 2024
Accepted: Mar. 13, 2025
Published Online: Mar. 13, 2025
The Author Email: ZHOU Jian-bin (2022736355@qq.com)