Professional Documents
Culture Documents
4, JULY/AUGUST 2013
1100510
I. INTRODUCTION
HE optical time-division multiplexing (OTDM) technique is considered as one alternative to construct nextgeneration high-speed all-optical-fiber networks [1], [2]. The
optical pulsed carrier with good stability and low amplitude jitter is a mandatory source for the OTDM system [3][5], which
can be generated from laser diodes or fiber lasers using gainswitching [6][8], Q-switching [9], and mode-locking [10][12]
1100510
IEEE JOURNAL OF SELECTED TOPICS IN QUANTUM ELECTRONICS, VOL. 19, NO. 4, JULY/AUGUST 2013
end-face reflectance of the FPLD cavity and effectively facilitates the external feedback injection, which is suitable for
establishing the external-cavity mode-locking due to its relatively wider gain spectrum and weaker mode selectivity. Unfortunately, the modulating frequency of such a WRC-FPLD is
previously reported to limit at 2.488 Gb/s [30]. Although the
broadband modulation with a digital data stream can still be
worked effectively by enlarging its throughput power and compensating its decayed frequency slope, such a high-power and
slope-compensated microwave amplifier for broadband digital
signal is too difficult to be accessed, and the power budget is too
high.
In this paper, the coupled-cavity and self-feedback architecture for harmonic mode-locking (HML) such a WRC-FPLD
is employed to exceed its modulation bandwidth over 10 GHz.
The pulsewidth, timing jitter, pulse extinction ratio, and spectral
linewidth of the HML output from such a self-feedback coupledcavity WRC-FPLD fiber ring by adjusting the biased current,
RF modulation power, and the feedback ratio of the WRCFPLD and coupled fiber ring are demonstrated. Subsequently,
the theoretical model of the self-feedback mode-locked system
is established to analyze the parametric tooling effects. The
evolution on optical spectrum of the self-feedback WRC-FPLD
fiber ring from gain-switching to the mode-locking regime and
the feature of significantly diminished WRC-FPLD longitudinal mode by mode-locking at an enlarged modulation depth and
optimized feedback ratio are measured and simulated. A significant broadening of the inherent single-mode linewidth with the
distinguished mode-locking operation is observed.
II. EXPERIMENTAL DETAILS
The experimental setup for self-feedback mode-locking the
WRC-FPLD directly modulated at 10 GHz is illustrated in Fig. 1
[31]. By using a WRC-FPLD with a threshold of 23 mA and a
longitudinal mode-spacing of 0.6 nm, the competition between
mechanisms of gain-switching and mode-locking in the WRCFPLD was investigated. The temperature and central wabelength
of the WRC-FPLD biased at 2.5 times of its threshold current
were controlled at 26 C and 1560 nm, respectively.
After passing through a power amplifier (Transcom TA085110-30-35) with a 35-dB gain, a microwave signal generated
from a commercial synthesizer (Agilent E8257C) with the frequency and power of 10 GHz and 4 dBm, respectively, was
applied to directly modulate the WRC-FPLD for further self-
i bias
S0 =
q
p 2 Rinj
2V
p V
N Ntr +
Rinj . (3)
g a g a
In (2), the solution of carrier number under the steady-state
condition is clamped on the threshold, it can be defined as the
threshold carrier number with self-feedback injection power.
The loss modulation of AML is a periodical sine or cosine
LEE et al.: HARMONIC MODE-LOCKING OF 10-GHZ DIRECTLY MODULATED WEAK-RESONANT-CAVITY FABRYPEROT LASER DIODE
(4)
Equation (4) describes the peak gain and the loss modulation
in the coupled WRC-FPLD fiber ring cavity, and the definition for the operation of the directly modulated WRC-FPLD is
modified in our case:
M [1 cos (m t)] 2m [1 cos (m t)]
(5)
1
Shigh
=
(6)
1M
Slow
where Shigh is the maximal photon number within modulation
period, and Slow is the minimum photon number, which clearly
describes the dynamic range of the modulation. In order to easily
investigate the term of modulation for the WRC-FPLD directly
modulated with commercial RF synthesizer, the photon number
is replaced by the biased current from (3)
in j
I
i (I b i a s +i m )
N i Nt qh
q
1
=
in j
i It h
i (I b i a s i m )
1M
N
q
N q
=
inj
Ibias Ith
+ im
inj
Ibias Ith
im
(7)
g
g
g
=
=
I
P
S
1 + /Isat
1 + /Psat
1 + /Ssat
(9)
1100510
4g lg
1
p = 2 2 ln 2
(11)
M
m g
where m is the modulation frequency and g is the gain bandwidth. Under the coupled-cavity and self-feedback injection
case, the complete solution of pulsewidth for the WRC-FPLD
fiber ring as a function of injection power ratio and modulation
driven current is described as, as shown (12), at the bottom of
this page.
Hereafter, two extreme cases are discussed to observe the
effect of power ratio and modulation current variation on
pulsewidth. Under insufficient modulation depth by assuming
that Ibias Ith,inj im and Ssat S0 , (12) can be simply
modified as
2 1/4
inj
1/2
I
bias
th
1
4alg i
p 2 2 ln 2
.
V N q
im
m g
(13)
Equation (13) clearly shows that the increasing injection
power ratio would cause pulse broadening. The residual amplified spontaneous emission (ASE) noise is left due to the insufficient modulation current. When increasing the injection power,
the additional ASE noise would be accumulated to weaken the
mode-locking force. Alternatively, when considering another
case with a sufficient modulation depth, the condition becomes
Ibias Ith,inj im and Ssat S0 , (12) can be modified as
1/4
1/2
4Ssat alg
1
(p 2 Rinj )/
p 2 2 ln 2
.
N V
m g
(14)
With the attenuation on ASE noise during each round trip,
the gain in the WRC-FPLD coupled fiber ring is completely
2
1/4
a
2V
64 2mln2g
Rinj + im Ni q
lg Ibias Ith + Ni q
V
a
g
i
N q 2V
I
+
R
+
i
I
/S
1 + 2 R
bias
th
inj
m
sat
q
i g a
( p
in j )
.
p =
2i
m
1
1
2V
Ibias Ith + Ni q
R
+
i
inj
m
ga
(12)
1100510
IEEE JOURNAL OF SELECTED TOPICS IN QUANTUM ELECTRONICS, VOL. 19, NO. 4, JULY/AUGUST 2013
i (Ibias Ith )
R = m =
qV
(15)
vg a
R
i
=
qV
I Ith
qV p
+
GN s
42 2 Sinj
(1 + 2 ) SL m
!"1/2
(17)
where GN denotes the optical confinement factor, p the photon
lifetime, s the spontaneous carrier lifetime, the coupling efficiency, the linewidth enhancement factor, Sinj the injection
photon number, and SL m the average output photon number. As
a result, the relaxation oscillation peak upshifts to a higher frequency as the front-face reflectance increases or the feedback
injection power enlarges. Both kinds of operations can provide a broadened modulation bandwidth with a more flattened
response. However, the conventional FPLD with a highly reflec-
Fig. 3. Pulsewidth and timing jitter of the self-feedback mode-locking WRCFPLD at different dc biases.
tive cavity does not favor the self-feedback injection, which also
results in a strong cavity mode with extremely high frequency of
longitudinal mode spacing. These become the detrimental factors for mode-locking the FPLD-incorporated fiber-ring laser.
The only way to release the strong cavity effect is to reduce one
end-face reflectance of the FPLD cavity; such a weak resonance
design effectively facilitates the external feedback injection. The
feedback injection further overcomes the slightly degraded modulation bandwidth caused by the reduced end-face reflectance.
Hence, the design of WRC-FPLD concurrently suppresses the
gain competition from FPLD cavity modes and improves the
modulation bandwidth.
In experiment, a 10-GHz HML pulse train generated from the
self-feedback WRC-FPLD is shown in the inset of Fig. 1. After
self-feedback mode-locking the WRC-FPLD at 10 GHz with
feedback ratio of 50% in the fiber ring, the original longitudinal
mode of the WRC-FPLD output is suppressed and the spectral
linewidth is broaden, as shown in Fig. 2 [31]. Such a change
on the optical spectrum is due to the competition of the WRCFPLD intracavity and the external fiber ring. Therefore, the
optical spectrum of self-feedback mode-locking WRC-FPLD
exhibits a longitudinal mode spacing of about 0.08 nm, which
is corresponded to the optical pulsed carrier of 10 GHz.
The influence on the pulsewidth and the timing jitter of the
optical pulsed carrier depends on the WRC-FPLD bias [35], and
it is discussed for optimizing the self-feedback mode-locking
WRC-FPLD output, as shown in Fig. 3. The relatively shortened
pulsewidth of 22 ps and a low timing jitter of 153 fs can be
observed at WRC-FPLD bias of 60 mA. If the biased current
of the WRC-FPLD is away from 60 mA, the degradation on
the pulsewidth and the timing jitter can be obtained because of
the worse mode-locking. Furthermore, the pulsewidth and the
timing jitter are increased to 38.8 and 1.55 ps with the enlarging
dc bias range of the WRC-FPLD from 60 to 80 mA, because
the excess carriers of the WRC-FPLD cannot be eliminated
to induce insufficient modulation depth. Relatively, the range
of the WRC-FPLD bias is decreased from 60 to 40 mA; the
pulsewidth and the timing jitter show the degraded trends due
to the limitation on the carrier recovery time.
To further verify the optimization on the self-feedback modelocking WRC-FPLD, the pulse extinction ratio and the spectral
LEE et al.: HARMONIC MODE-LOCKING OF 10-GHZ DIRECTLY MODULATED WEAK-RESONANT-CAVITY FABRYPEROT LASER DIODE
Fig. 4. Pulse extinction ratio and spectral linewidth of the self-feedback modelocking carrier at different WRC-FPLD dc biases.
1100510
Fig. 6. Pulse extinction ratio and spectral linewidth of the self-feedback modelocking WRC-FPLD output versus feedback ratios.
Dg
g
g
0
a = 4
= 4 2
= 4
(19)
Ms
g Ms
2
g Ms 1 + PPsiant
where Dg = g/2g ; g is the gain bandwidth.
In principle, the physical limitation on pulsewidth of the actively mode-locked WRC-FPLD is still limited by the gain bandwidth of the WRC-FPLD. The pulsewidth is correlated with the
ratio between gain dispersion Dg and modulation strength Ms ,
as shown in (19). In comparison, the increase of bias current not
only enlarges the gain but also shrinks the gain bandwidth of the
WRC-FPLD. Both variations eventually lead to the broadening
of the mode-locked pulsewidth and the shrinkage of spectral
linewidth at larger bias conditions. Therefore, the feedback ratio significantly impacts the enlarged spectral linewidth than the
biased current of WRC-FPLD for optimizing the self-feedback
mode-locking WRC-FPLD fiber laser. When using a conventional RSOA with an external fiber-ring cavity of highly reflective feedback, there will be only one set of longitudinal mode
contributed by the fiber-ring resonant cavity as the RSOA is a
1100510
Fig. 7.
ratios.
IEEE JOURNAL OF SELECTED TOPICS IN QUANTUM ELECTRONICS, VOL. 19, NO. 4, JULY/AUGUST 2013
Fig. 8.
Fig. 9.
It is mandatory to adjust the RF modulation power for optimizing the HML in the WRC-FPLD incorporated fiber-ring
with a 90% feedback. The increasing RF power enlarges the
modulation depth to suppress the longitudinal mode by 30 dB
and to broaden the spectral linewidth up to 7.6 nm, as shown in
Fig. 9 [31]. This is mainly attributed to a strengthened modelocking force, which significantly broadens the linewidth of a
single longitudinal mode by 4 times (from 0.1 to 0.4 nm). In
the meantime, the HML mode feature becomes dominated on
the optical spectrum when enlarging the RF power up to 25
dBm, as shown in Fig. 10 [31]. In previous work [30], the digital data transmission is limited at a bit-rate of 2.5 Gb/s, which
requires a broadband and flattened modulation response of the
WRC-FPLD-based transmitter. That is, the throughput power
of the modulated RF signal cannot be decayed or varied too
much within the modulation bandwidth. In principle, the modulation bandwidth is defined as the attenuation on the throughput
modulation power by 3 dB. Nonetheless, the whole modulation response could extend to a much higher frequency with a
dramatically decreased throughput. That is, the modulation can
still be worked effectively by enlarging the power of modulation signal. For optical communication applications, it is not
easy to obtain a broadband high-power amplifier for encoding
LEE et al.: HARMONIC MODE-LOCKING OF 10-GHZ DIRECTLY MODULATED WEAK-RESONANT-CAVITY FABRYPEROT LASER DIODE
Fig. 10.
1100510
Fig. 11. MER and spectral linewidth of the HML WRC-FPLD with different
RF powers.
the broadband digital data [28], the compensation on the decayed slope of the modulation throughput is too difficult, and
the overall power budget for covering the whole bandwidth of a
digital data up to 10 Gb/s is too high. In contrast, it only needs
a microwave amplifier with narrow bandwidth for amplifying
the sinusoidal-wave signal to mode-lock the WRC-FPLD-based
fiber-ring laser. Therefore, it is noted that the narrow-band modulation throughput of WRC-FPLD can be effectively promoted
by simply increasing the power of RF modulation signal and the
dc bias current.
Fig. 11 shows an increasing trend of the linewidth broadening with enlarging RF power for the HMLWRC-FPLD, whereas
the linear decreasing MER clearly indicates the strong modelocking force in the WRC-FPLD when enlarging the RF power
up to 0 dBm before the amplification with a 35-dB gain power
amplifier. The theoretical simulation on the transform-limited
pulsewidth can be as short as 0.16 ps if the negative chirp of
the HML WRC-FPLD can be properly compensated. The HML
WRC-FPLD pulse trace measured by the oscilloscope (Agilent
86109B) is shown in Fig. 12, the HML pulse shows a shortened
pulsewidth of 22 ps and a timing jitter of 153 fs at 10 GHz provided by higher RF powers. An extremely large frequency chirp
also accompanies with the shortened pulsewidth and broadened
linewidth of the WRC-FPLD under HML operation, whereas
the pulsewidth inevitably broasens with decreasing modulation
1100510
IEEE JOURNAL OF SELECTED TOPICS IN QUANTUM ELECTRONICS, VOL. 19, NO. 4, JULY/AUGUST 2013
nsp
(2 Nm o de + 1)
4ph S
(20)
which is derived from the rate equations for the carrier density
and the photon number, where Nm o de is the number of longitudinal modes after mode-locking, is the linewidth enhancement
factor, is the noise enhancement factor, nsp is the inversion
factor, ph is the photon lifetime, and S is the average photon number. Therefore, the variations of the mode linewidth are
strongly related to the increasing mode number as well as the
enhancing mode-locking force, such that the phase fluctuation
leads to the linewidth broadening of the inherent longitudinal
WRC-FPLD modes.
Fig. 14 shows the experimental and simulated single-mode
linewidth versus the number of mode-locked longitudinal
modes. This is a straightforward result when the mode-locking
effect is enhanced. The linewidth of the longitudinal mode
broadens when the mode-locking effect leads to suppress the
gain-switching effect in WRC-FPLD. The variation of the
single-mode linewidth is observed by controlling the modulation
depth with increasing RF power; a sufficient modulation power
would lead to a better performance of the HML operation in the
WRC-FPLD coupled fiber ring. The pulse gradually narrows
with the enhancement of mode-locking force. In the meantime,
the linewidth broadening can be predicted by Fourier transform to convert the variation from time domain into frequency
domain. Therefore, the same tendency on the increasing single-
Fig. 14. Experimental and simulated single-mode linewidth versus the number
of mode-locked longitudinal modes.
LEE et al.: HARMONIC MODE-LOCKING OF 10-GHZ DIRECTLY MODULATED WEAK-RESONANT-CAVITY FABRYPEROT LASER DIODE
and the feedback ratio with the contribution of a fiber ring has
been discussed. If the WRC-FPLD is biased at below 60 mA, the
performance of the HML degrades since the insufficient carriers
in the WRC-FPLD cannot be used to trigger the self-feedback
mode-locking at 10 GHz. Moreover, the degradation on the
mode-locking output is also observed because of the excessive
carriers induced additional dc level, which leads to the relative
deficiency of the modulation depth. Furthermore, by enlarging
the feedback ratio of the self-feedback fiber ring from 10% to
90%, the longitudinal mode spacing and the linewidth of the
self-feedback mode-locking WRC-FPLD output are decreased
from 0.6 to 0.08 nm (corresponding to the pulse repetition rate
of 10 GHz) and broaden form 1.25 to 7.6 nm, respectively, due
to the increasing of the HML. Then, by modifying the modelocking theory of master equation with rate equations of the
self-feedback structure, the ideal performance of optical pulse
train can be obtained when some parameters are changed in
the system. In this way, we establish a discussion under the
AML technique to study the mode-locking force which conforms to our situation and experimental result. With optimizing
our scheme to the strongest mode-locking force, the extinction
ratio of the CW lasing modes in the WRC-FPLD is greatly
suppressed from 10.5 to 3 dB, whereas the HML modes in
WRC-FPLD enlarges from 1.3 to 4 dB. A narrower spectral
linewidth of 3 nm and an MER of 32 dB are observed when the
WRC-FPLD is CW lasing. With the enhancement of HML by
increasing of RF power up to 28 dBm, the degradation on the
original longitudinal mode of the WRC-FPLD becomes significant to provide an MER decreasing from 32 to 2.8 dB. The pulse
extinction ratio of 0.9 and 13.6 dB can be obtained when the
HML mechanism in the WRC-FPLD is optimized. Because the
phase fluctuation induces a linewidth broadening of the WRCFPLD modes after mode-locking, the 30-dB suppression on
the longitudinal mode of the WRC-FPLD and an enhancement
on the mode-locked modes to 7 dB lead to the degradation
of the MER and the broadening of the spectral linewidth under the self-feedback mode-locking structure. The relationship
between the single-mode linewidth and the number of longitudinal modes after mode-locking can be described as a function
that an expected trend would be discussed and verified on the
theoretical simulation and experimental result. Optimization of
HML-pulsed carrier with a spectral linewidth of up to 7.6 nm, a
highly chirped pulsewidth of 22 ps (without appropriate linear
dispersion compensation), and a timing jitter of 153 fs can be
observed from the 10-GHz directly modulated and harmonic
mode-locked WRC-FPLD with a 90% strong self-feedback by
using a circulated fiber ring.
REFERENCES
[1] S. Kawanishi, Ultrahigh-speed optical time-division-multiplexed transmission technology based on optical signal processing, IEEE J. Quantum
Electron., vol. 34, no. 11, pp. 20642079, Nov. 1998.
[2] J. M. Roth, T. G. Ulmer, N. W. Spellmeyer, S. Constantine, and
M. E. Grein, Wavelength-tunable 40-GHz picosecond harmonically
mode-locked fiber laser source, IEEE Photon. Technol. Lett., vol. 16,
no. 9, pp. 20092011, Sep. 2004.
[3] P. P. Vasilev, I. H White, and J. Gowar, Fast phenomena in semiconductor lasers, Rep. Progr. Phys., vol. 63, no. 12, pp. 19972042, Oct.
2000.
1100510
[4] G.-R. Lin, C.-K. Lee, and J.-J. Kang, Rational harmonic mode-locking
pulse quality of the dark-optical-comb injected semiconductor optical
amplifier fiber ring laser, Opt. Exp., vol. 16, no. 12, pp. 92139221, Jun.
2008.
[5] J.-J. Kang, Y.-C. Lin, C.-K. Lee, and G.-R. Lin, Peak equalization of
rational-harmonic-mode-locking fiberized semiconductor laser pulse via
optical injection induced gain modulation, Opt. Exp., vol. 17, no. 2,
pp. 850859, Jan. 2009.
[6] P.-T. Ho, L. A. Glasser, E. P. Ippen, and H. A. Haus, Picosecond pulse
generation with a CW GaAlAs laser diode, Appl. Phys. Lett., vol. 33,
pp. 241242, Aug. 1978.
[7] Y. C. Chi and G.-R. Lin, Distinguished RZ-OOK performances between
DFBLD pulsed carriers self-started by gain switching and nonlinear absorption modulation, IEEE J. Sel. Topics Quantum. Electron., vol. 17,
no. 5, pp. 11461152, Sep./Oct. 2011.
[8] C. C. Lin, H. C. Kuo, P. C. Peng, and G.-R. Lin, Chirp and error
rate analyses of an optical-injection gain-switching VCSEL based alloptical NRZ-to-PRZ converter, Opt. Exp., vol. 16, pp. 48384847, Mar.
2008.
[9] J. W. Gates and R. G. N. Hall, Optical amplification of apparent rate of
rotation of a reflector in Q-switching a laser resonator, Nature, vol. 206,
p. 1141, Jun. 1965.
[10] G.-R. Lin and I. H. Chiu, 110-pJ and 410-fs pulse at 10 GHz generated by
single-stage external fiber compression of optically injection-mode-locked
semiconductor optical amplifier fiber laser, IEEE Photonic Technol. Lett.,
vol. 18, no. 9, pp. 10101012, May 2006.
[11] Y. T. Lin and G.-R. Lin, Dual-stage soliton compression of a self-started
additive pulse mode-locked erbium-doped fiber laser for 48 fs pulse generation, Opt. Lett., vol. 31, pp. 13821384, May 2006.
[12] M. F. Becker, D. J. Kuizenga, and A. E. Siegman, Harmonic mode locking of the Nd:YAG laser, IEEE J. Quantum Electron., vol. QE-8, no. 8,
pp. 687693, Aug. 1972.
[13] G.-R. Lin, J. J. Kang, and C. K. Lee, High-order rational harmonic modelocking and pulse-amplitude equalization of SOAFL via reshaped gainswitching FPLD pulse injection, Opt. Exp., vol. 18, pp. 95709579, Apr.
2010.
[14] Y. C. Lin, G. H. Peng, and G.-R. Lin, Compression of 200GHz DWDM
channelized TDM pulsed carrier from optically mode-locking WRCFPLD fiber ring at 10 GHz, Opt. Exp., vol. 17, pp. 55265532, Mar.
2009.
[15] E. P. Ippen, Principles of passive mode locking, Appl. Phys. B, vol. 58,
pp. 159170, Mar. 1994.
[16] J. B. Schlager, B. E. Callicoatt, R. P. Mirin, and N. A. Sanford, Passively
mode-locked waveguide laser with low residual jitter, IEEE Photon.
Technol. Lett., vol. 14, no. 9, pp. 13511353, Sep. 2002.
[17] B. Bakhshi, P. A. Andrekson, and X. P. Zhang, A polarizationmaintaining and dispersion-managed 10-GHz mode-locked Erbium fiber
ring laser providing both sech2 - and Gaussian-shaped pulses, Opt. Fiber
Technol., vol. 4, pp. 293303, Jul. 1998.
[18] E. D. Park, T. J. Croeze, P. J. Delfyett, Jr., A. Braun, and J. Abeles, Multiwavelength mode-locked InGaAsP laser operating at 12 ch x 2 GHz and
16 ch x 10 GHz, IEEE Photon. Technol. Lett., vol. 14, no. 6, pp. 837839,
Jun. 2002.
[19] G.-R. Lin and Y. S. Liao, Dynamics of optical backward-injectioninduced gain-depletion modulation and mode locking in semiconductor
optical amplifier fiber lasers, Opt. Exp., vol. 12, pp. 20172026, Apr.
2004.
[20] G.-R. Lin, I-H. Chiu, and M. C. Wu, 1.2-ps mode-locked semiconductor
optical amplifier fiber laser pulses generated by 60-ps backward darkoptical comb injection and soliton compression, Opt. Exp., vol. 13,
pp. 10081014, Feb. 2005.
[21] K. Sato, H. Ishii, I. Kotaka, Y. Kondo, and M. Yamamoto, Frequency
range extension of actively mode-locked lasers integrated with electroabsorption modulators using chirped gratings, IEEE J. Sel. Topics Quantum
Electron., vol. 3, no. 2, pp. 250255, Apr. 1997.
[22] G.-R. Lin, Y. C. Chang, and J. R. Wu, Rational harmonic mode-locking
of erbium-doped fiber laser at 40 GHz using a loss-modulated Fabry-Perot
laser diode, IEEE Photon. Technol. Lett., vol. 16, no. 8, pp. 18101812,
Aug. 2004.
[23] S. Yamashita and M. Asano, Wide and fast wavelength-tunable modelocked fiber laser based on dispersion tuning, Opt. Exp., vol. 14, pp. 9299
9306, Oct. 2006.
[24] M. G. Vasilev, A. M. Vasilev, and A. A. Shelyakin, High-power
InP/GaInAsP buried heterostructure semiconductor laser with a modulation band of up to 10 GHz, Inorg. Mater., vol. 46, pp. 10131018, Sep.
2010.
1100510
IEEE JOURNAL OF SELECTED TOPICS IN QUANTUM ELECTRONICS, VOL. 19, NO. 4, JULY/AUGUST 2013