Injection-locked diode laser current modulation for Pound-Drever-Hall frequency stabilization using transfer cavities

TL;DR

This paper demonstrates a method to stabilize laser frequencies using injection-locked diode lasers with phase modulated RF current sources, enabling precise control via Pound-Drever-Hall technique and transfer cavities.

Contribution

It introduces a novel approach to generate tunable phase modulated sidebands on diode lasers for improved frequency stabilization using transfer cavities.

Findings

Successful stabilization of a 780 nm diode laser using transfer cavity

Frequency stabilization of a 776 nm laser via transfer cavity lock

Observation of hyperfine transitions confirms stability

Abstract

A phase modulated RF current source is applied to an injection locked diode laser operating at $780\unit{nm}$. This produces tunable phase modulated sidebands of the laser suitable for stabilizing the length of an optical transfer cavity using the Pound-Drever-Hall technique. The Pound-Drever-Hall signal is anti-symmetric about the lock point, despite the presence of significant diode laser amplitude modulation. The stabilized optical transfer cavity is used to frequency stabilize a 776 nm external cavity diode laser. The stability and tunability of this transfer cavity locked laser is established by observation of the hyperfine components of the $^{87}$Rb $5P_{3/2}-5D_{5/2}$ transition in a vapor cell.