title: Impact of amplified spontaneous emission on Brillouin scattering of a single-frequency signal.
abstract: We experimentally investigated the influence of amplified spontaneous emission within the Brillouin gain bandwidth on the Brillouin scattering of a single-frequency signal. The experiments were performed for the case of artificial ASE injected in backward direction into a passive fiber, as well as in forward direction of a low-power fiber amplifier. A significant influence could be observed, when the ASE was counter-propagating to the signal. Injecting 160.6 nW of ASE within the Brillouin gain bandwidth led to a decrease of about 3 dB of the SBS-threshold of an approximately 335 m long passive fiber from about 80 mW to less than 40 mW. At a fixed signal power of 81 mW the backscattered power and the power in the Brillouin scattered Stokes maximum increased by a factor of 19.
authors.affiliation: Laser Zentrum Hannover eV, Hannover, Germany. m.karow@lzh.de
authors.forename: Malte
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Karow
authors.forename: Jörg
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Neumann
authors.forename: Dietmar
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Kracht
authors.forename: Peter
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Weßels