Patent ID: 7869053

Claim:
An optical sampler with high temporal resolution, comprising: a terabit optical asymmetric demultiplexer (TOAD) device including a loop optical path having an input for inputting an optical signal to be sampled, the optical signal having a duration, a source for generating an optical control signal and for inputting the control signal to the optical path, a delay line for delaying the control signal to change a temporal position of a transmittance window, and control means in the optical path; measurement means for measuring a mean power at an output of the optical path for each window position; delay control means for controlling the delay line to move step-by-step the transmittance window having a window duration greater than the duration of the optical signal in a temporal interval at least equal to the duration of the optical signal; and processing means for performing a derivative on the temporal interval of the mean powers measured to thus obtain data samples representing the optical signal.