Rocking bidirectional lasers

Abstract We study the emission properties of a class A bidirectional laser under the action of an amplitude modulated injected signal, i.e. a rocked bidirectional laser. We derive two coupled autonomous amplitude equations valid close to the emission threshold and study their solutions. The most relevant result is that while in the absence of rocking the laser can only emit in either of the two unidirectional solutions, under suitable rocking conditions cw bidirectional emission appears and, moreover, it coexist bistably with unidirectional emission.