Optical frequency combs with repetition rates in the few-GHz (1-10 GHz) range are key devices for precision spectroscopy and low-noise microwave synthesis. The dense spectral lines of these combs enable high-precision frequency calibration and direct integration with mature radio-frequency electronics systems. However, achieving low-noise Kerr soliton optical frequency combs in a miniaturized package has long been a technical challenge in this field. A collaborative team led by Professor Xie Zhenda and Associate Professor Jia Kunpeng from the academician Zhu Shining's group at Nanjing University, along with Researcher Liang Wei's team from the Suzhou Institute of Nano-Tech and Nano-Bionics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, has successfully developed a palm-sized 1.7 GHz Kerr soliton microcomb module based on a few-mode fiber Fabry-Pérot microcavity (FM-FFPR). The phase noise of the optical comb approaches the quantum noise limit.
