PATENT CLAIM ANALYSIS

Application Number: 15974313
Application Type: Utility
Filing Date: 2018-05
Publication Date: 2018-09
Patent Classification: ["385", "128000"]

Abstract:
In an optical device, a ring-resonator modulator, having an adjustable resonance (center) wavelength, receives an optical signal that includes a carrier wavelength from an input-output optical waveguide. Then, a monitoring mechanism monitors a performance metric (such as an average power or a signal swing) of a monitor optical signal from the ring-resonator modulator. Moreover, control logic in the optical device adjusts the resonance wavelength based on the monitored performance metric so that the resonance wavelength is locked to the carrier wavelength. In particular, the control logic may apply a change to an adjustment signal that is provided to the ring-resonator modulator. If the change increases the performance metric, the control logic may continue to modify the resonance wavelength. Otherwise, the control logic may modify the resonance wavelength by applying one or more changes, having an opposite sign to the change, to the adjustment signal.

Claim (Index 1):
A method for locking a resonance wavelength of a ring-resonator modulator to a carrier wavelength of an optical signal, wherein the method comprises:\n providing an input optical signal to the ring-resonator modulator, wherein the input optical signal has the carrier wavelength; monitoring a performance metric associated with a monitor optical signal from the ring-resonator modulator, wherein the monitor optical signal has the resonance wavelength, and wherein the performance metric includes an optical power associated with the monitor optical signal, and a signal swing of the monitor optical signal; and adjusting the resonance wavelength based on the performance metric, wherein the adjusting involves:\n modifying the resonance wavelength by applying a change to an adjustment signal that is provided to the ring-resonator modulator, wherein the adjustment signals includes a heater current; \n determining an impact on the performance metric of the change in the adjustment signal; \n if the change increases the performance metric, continuing to modify the resonance wavelength by applying a set of changes to the adjustment signal, wherein the adjustment signal is increased by progressively smaller magnitudes as the adjustment signal approaches a maximum value, and wherein the modifications to the resonance wavelength are performed on a time scale of a thermal mass of the ring-resonator modulator; and \n otherwise, modifying the resonance wavelength by applying another set of changes, having an opposite sign to the change and the set of changes, to the adjustment signal.

Metadata:
- Claim Count in Document: 3.0
- Percentile: 93.0
- Lexical Diversity: 2.37681
- Patent Class: 385.0
- Transitional Phrase Type: none
- Component Type: 0
- Foreign Priority: False
- Related Applications: ['14463654', '14516301', '14203876', '14714078', '15019616']

Analysis Scores:
- 35 USC 101 Eligibility (BERT): 0.8429577461520583
- 35 USC 102 Novelty (BERT): 0.5468123347938603
- Combined Prediction Score: 0.8133432050162386
- Mean Citation Score: 301.4966100000001
- Max Citation Score: 403.1932
- Similarity Product: 362.42026284878256

Labels:
- Claim Label 101: 1
- Claim Label 102: 1
- Claim Label 103: 0
- Claim Label 112: 1
- Combined Label: 1
- Label 101 Adjusted: 1

Dataset: test