New role for nonlinear dynamics and chaos in integrated semiconductor laser technology.

Using an integrated colliding-pulse mode-locked semiconductor laser, we demonstrate the existence of nonlinear dynamics and chaos in photonic integrated circuits (PICs) by demonstrating a period-doubling transition into chaos. Unlike their stand-alone counterparts, the dynamics of PICs are more stable over the lifetime of the system, reproducible from batch to batch and on faster time scales due to the small sizes of PICs.