Practical issues in repetition-rate control of optical pulse trains and frequency combs by Talbot self-imaging

Talbot self-imaging has been utilized for arbitrary repetition-rate control of optical pulse trains and frequency combs, which are important for many applications. The fundamental theory of generalized Talbot self-imaging has been presented for the design of temporal and spectral phase operations, while the effects of potential phase modulation distortions and residual dispersions on repetition-rate control in experiments remain to be investigated. In this paper, numerical studies are conducted for evaluating the feasibility of yielding arbitrary repetition-rate control of optical pulse trains and frequency combs, and it provides additional insights into the optimal design conditions for practical implementation of the scheme.