A photonic mm-wave frequency sextupler using an integrated Mach-Zehnder modulator with three arms

A novel photonic mm-wave frequency sextupling scheme based on an integrated Mach-Zehnder modulator with three arms is proposed in this article. Without any optical filter, a high-quality frequency sextupling mm-wave signal can be generated. Compared with mm-wave generation schemes based on traditional two-arm Mach-Zehnder modulators, the proposed scheme does not need DC bias and a complex electrical bias control circuit. Some non-ideal factors are taken into consideration to verify its performance, which proves that a slight deviation of the ideal values does not cause great degradation of the performance of the mm-wave generation scheme.