2020-Present

Qing-Xin Ji, Wei Zhang, Anatoliy Savchenkov, Peng Liu, Shuman Sun, Warren Jin, Joel Guo, Jonathan Peters, Lue Wu, Avi Feshali, Mario Paniccia, Vladimir Ilchenko, John Bowers, Andrey Matsko & Kerry Vahala
"Dispersive-wave-agile optical frequency division"
Nature Photonics (2025)

Peng Liu*, Qing-Xin Ji*, Jin-Yu Liu*, Jinhao Ge*, Mingxiao Li, Joel Guo, Warren Jin, Maodong Gao, Yan Yu, Avi Feshali, Mario Paniccia, John E. Bowers & Kerry J. Vahala
"Near-visible integrated soliton microcombs with detectable repetition rates"
Nature Communications 16, 4780 (2025)

Bohan Li*, Zhiquan Yuan*, James Williams, Warren Jin, Adrian Beckert, Tian Xie, Joel Guo, Avi Feshali, Mario Paniccia, Andrei Faraon, John Bowers, Alireza Marandi & Kerry Vahala
"Down-converted photon pairs in a high-Q silicon nitride microresonator"
Nature 639, 922–927(2025)

Qing-Xin Ji, Wei Zhang, Lue Wu, Warren Jin, Joel Guo, Avi Feshali, Mario Paniccia, John Bowers, Andrey Matsko, and Kerry Vahala
"Coherent optical-to-microwave link using an integrated microcomb"
IEEE Journal of Selected Topics in Quantum Electronics

Yang He, Long Cheng, Heming Wang, Yu Zhang, Roy Meade, Kerry Vahala , Mian Zhang, and Jiang Li
"Chip-scale high-performance photonic microwave oscillator"
Science Advances 10, eado9570 (2024)

Maodong Gao*, Zhiquan Yuan*, Yan Yu*, Warren Jin, Qing-Xin Ji, Jinhao Ge, Avi Feshali, Mario Paniccia, John E. Bowers, and Kerry J. Vahala
"Observation of interband Kelly sidebands in coupled-ring soliton microcombs"
Optica 11, 940-944 (2024)

Qing-Xin Ji*, Peng Liu*, Warren Jin*, Joel Guo, Lue Wu, Zhiquan Yuan, Jonathan Peters, Avi Feshali, Mario Paniccia, John E. Bowers, and Kerry J. Vahala
"Multimodality integrated microresonators using the Moiré speedup effect"
Science 383, 1080-1083 (2024)
Science Perspective

Igor Kudelin, William Groman, Qing-Xin Ji, Joel Guo, Megan L. Kelleher, Dahyeon Lee, Takuma Nakamura, Charles A. McLemore, Pedram Shirmohammadi, Samin Hanifi, Haotian Cheng, Naijun Jin, Lue Wu, Samuel Halladay, Yizhi Luo, Zhaowei Dai, Warren Jin, Junwu Bai, Yifan Liu, Wei Zhang, Chao Xiang, Lin Chang, Vladimir Iltchenko, Owen Miller, Andrey Matsko, Steven M. Bowers, Peter T. Rakich, Joe C. Campbell, John E. Bowers, Kerry J. Vahala, Franklyn Quinlan, and Scott A. Diddams
"Photonic chip-based low-noise microwave oscillator"
Nature 627, 534-539 (2024)
NIST news

Bohan Li*, Zhiquan Yuan*, Warren Jin*, Lue Wu, Joel Guo, Qing-Xin Ji, Avi Feshali, Mario Paniccia, John E. Bowers, Kerry J. Vahala
"High-coherence hybrid-integrated 780 nm source by self-injection-locked second-harmonic generation in a high-Q silicon-nitride resonator"
Optica 10, 1241-1244 (2023)

Zhiquan Yuan*, Maodong Gao*, Yan Yu*, Heming Wang*, Warren Jin*, Qing-Xin Ji, Avi Feshali, Mario Paniccia, John E. Bowers and Kerry J. Vahala
"Soliton pulse pairs at multiple colours in normal dispersion microresonators"
Nature Photonics 17, 977-983 (2023)
Caltech News

Chao Xiang*, Warren Jin*, Osama Terra*, Bozhang Dong*, Heming Wang, Lue Wu, Joel Guo, Theodore J. Morin, Eamonn Hughes, Jonathan Peters, Qing-Xin Ji, Avi Feshali, Mario Paniccia, Kerry J. Vahala and John E. Bowers
"3D integration enables ultralow-noise isolator-free lasers in silicon photonics"
Nature 620, 78-85 (2023)

Lue Wu*, Weiqiang Xie*, Hao-Jing Chen*, Kellan Colburn, Chao Xiang, Lin Chang, Warren Jin, Jin-Yu Liu, Yan Yu, Yoshihisa Yamamoto, John E. Bowers, Myoung-Gyun Suh, and Kerry J. Vahala
"AlGaAs soliton microcombs at room temperature"
Optics Letters 48, 3853-3856 (2023)

Lue Wu, Maodong Gao, Jin-Yu Liu, Hao-Jing Chen, Kellan Colburn, Henry A. Blauvelt, and Kerry J. Vahala
"Hydroxyl ion absorption in on-chip high-Q resonators"
Optics Letters 48, 3511-3514 (2023)

Yang He*, Raymond Lopez-Rios*, Usman A. Javid, Jingwei Ling, Mingxiao Li, Shixin Xue, Kerry J. Vahala, and Qiang Lin
"High-speed tunable microwave-rate soliton microcomb"
Nature Communications 14, 3467 (2023)

Jingwei Ling*, Jeremy Staffa*, Heming Wang*, Boqiang Shen*, Lin Chang*, Usman A. Javid, Lue Wu, Zhiquan Yuan, Raymond Lopez-Rios, Mingxiao Li, Yang He, Bohan Li, John E. Bowers, Kerry J. Vahala, and Qiang Lin
"Self-Injection Locked Frequency Conversion Laser"
Laser Photonics Rev. 2023, 2200663

Qing-Xin Ji*, Warren Jin*, Lue Wu*, Yan Yu*, Zhiquan Yuan, Wei Zhang, Maodong Gao, Bohan Li, Heming Wang, Chao Xiang, Joel Guo, Avi Feshali, Mario Paniccia, Vladimir S. Ilchenko, Andrey B. Matsko, John E. Bowers and Kerry J. Vahala
"Engineered zero-dispersion microcombs using CMOS-ready photonics"
Optica 10, 279-285 (2023)

Jiang Li and Kerry J. Vahala
"Small-sized, ultra-low phase noise photonic microwave oscillators at X-Ka bands"
Optica 10, 33-34 (2023)

Heming Wang, Boqiang Shen, Yan Yu, Zhiquan Yuan, Chengying Bao, Warren Jin, Lin Chang, Mark A. Leal, Avi Feshali, Mario Paniccia, John E. Bowers, and Kerry J. Vahala
"Self-regulating soliton switching waves in microresonators"
Physical Review A 106, 053508 (2022)

Joel Guo*, Charles A. McLemore*, Chao Xiang, Dahyeon Lee, Lue Wu, Warren Jin, Megan Kelleher, Naijun Jin, David Mason, Lin Chang, Avi Feshali, Mario Paniccia, Peter T. Rakich, Kerry J. Vahala, Scott A. Diddams, Franklyn Quinlan, John E. Bowers
"Chip-based laser with 1-hertz integrated linewidth"
Science Advances 8, 43 (2022)

Minh A. Tran*, Chong Zhang*, Theodore J. Morin*, Lin Chang, Sabyasachi Barik, Zhiquan Yuan, Woonghee Lee, Glenn Kim, Aditya Malik, Zeyu Zhang, Joel Guo, Heming Wang, Boqiang Shen, Lue Wu, Kerry J. Vahala, John E. Bowers, Hyundai Park, and Tin Komljenovic
"Extending the spectrum of fully integrated photonics to submicrometre wavelengths"
Nature 610, 54-60 (2022)

Mingxiao Li*, Lin Chang*, Lue Wu, Jeremy Staffa, Jingwei Ling, Usman A. Javid, Shixin Xue, Yang He, Raymond Lopez-rios, Theodore J. Morin, Heming Wang, Boqiang Shen, Siwei Zeng, Lin Zhu, Kerry J. Vahala, John E. Bowers, Qiang Lin
"Integrated Pockels Laser"
Nature Communications 13, 5344 (2022)

Zhiquan Yuan*, Heming Wang*, Peng Liu*, Bohan Li, Boqiang Shen, Maodong Gao, Lin Chang, Warren Jin, Avi Feshali, Mario Paniccia, John Bowers and Kerry J. Vahala
"Correlated self-heterodyne method for ultra-low-noise laser linewidth measurements"
Optics Express 30, 25147-25161 (2022)

Yu-Hung Lai*, Zhiquan Yuan*, Myoung-Gyun Suh, Yu-Kun Lu, Heming Wang and Kerry J. Vahala
"Brillouin Backaction Thermometry for Modal Temperature Control"
Optica 9, 701-705 (2022)

Maodong Gao*, Qi-Fan Yang*, Qing-Xin Ji*, Heming Wang, Lue Wu, Boqiang Shen, Junqiu Liu, Guanhao Huang, Lin Chang, Weiqiang Xie, Su-Peng Yu, Scott B. Papp, John E. Bowers, Tobias J. Kippenberg, Kerry J. Vahala
"Probing material absorption and optical nonlinearity of integrated photonic materials"
Nature Communications 13, 3323 (2022)

Jiang Li*, Chengying Bao*, Qing-Xin Ji*, Heming Wang, Lue Wu, Stephanie Leifer, Charles Beichman, and Kerry Vahala
"Efficiency of pulse pumped soliton microcombs"
Optica 9, 231-239 (2022)

Chao Xiang, Joel Guo, Warren Jin, Lue Wu, Jonathan Peters, Weiqiang Xie, Lin Chang, Boqiang Shen, Heming Wang, Qi-Fan Yang, David Kinghorn, Mario Paniccia, Kerry J. Vahala, Paul A. Morton and John E. Bowers
"High-performance lasers for fully integrated silicon nitride photonics"
Nature Communications 12, 6650 (2021)

Chengying Bao*, Zhiquan Yuan*, Lue Wu, Myoung-Gyun Suh, Heming Wang, Qiang Lin and Kerry J. Vahala
"Architecture for microcomb-based GHz-mid-infrared dual-comb spectroscopy"
Nature Communications 12, 6573 (2021)

Bohan Li*, Warren Jin*, Lue Wu, Lin Chang, Heming Wang, Boqiang Shen, Zhiquan Yuan, Avi Feshali, Mario Paniccia, Kerry J. Vahala, and John E. Bowers
"Reaching fiber-laser coherence in integrated photonics"
Optics Letters 46, 5201 (2021)

Mikael Mazur*, Myoung-Gyun Suh*, Attila Fülöp, Jochen Schröder, Victor Torres-Company, Magnus Karlsson, Kerry J. Vahala and Peter A. Andrekson
"High spectral efficiency coherent superchannel transmission with soliton microcombs"
Journal of Lightwave Technology 39, 4367 (2021)

Qi-Fan Yang*, Qing-Xin Ji*, Lue Wu*, Boqiang Shen, Heming Wang, Chengying Bao, Zhiquan Yuan and Kerry J. Vahala
"Dispersive-wave induced noise limits in miniature soliton microwave sources"
Nature Communications 12, 1442 (2021)

Warren Jin*, Qi-Fan Yang*, Lin Chang*, Boqiang Shen*, Heming Wang*, Mark A. Leal, Lue Wu, Avi Feshali, Mario Paniccia, Kerry J. Vahala and John E. Bowers
"Hertz-linewidth semiconductor lasers using CMOS-ready ultra-high-Q microresonators"
Nature Photonics 15, 346–353 (2021)

Chengying Bao, Myoung-Gyun Suh, Boqiang Shen, Kemal Şafak, Anan Dai, Heming Wang, Lue Wu, Zhiquan Yuan, Qi-Fan Yang, Andrey B. Matsko, Franz X. Kärtner and Kerry J. Vahala
"Quantum diffusion of microcavity solitons"
Nature Physics 17, 462–466 (2021)
Nature Physics News and Views

Chengying Bao, Boqiang Shen, Myoung-Gyun Suh, Heming Wang, Kemal Şafak, Anan Dai, Andrey B. Matsko, Franz X. Kärtner and Kerry J. Vahala
"Oscillatory motion of a counterpropagating Kerr soliton dimer"
Physical Review A 103, L011501 (2021)

Heming Wang, Yu-Kun Lu, Lue Wu, Dong Yoon Oh, Boqiang Shen, Seung Hoon Lee, Kerry Vahala
"Dirac solitons in optical microresonators"
Light: Science & Applications 9, 205 (2020)

Lue Wu*, Heming Wang*, Qi-Fan Yang, Qing-Xin Ji, Boqiang Shen, Chengying Bao, Maodong Gao, Kerry Vahala
"Greater than one billion Q-factor for on-chip microresonators"
Optics Letters 45, 5129-5131 (2020)

Zhiquan Yuan*, Heming Wang*, Lue Wu*, Maodong Gao, Kerry Vahala
"Linewidth enhancement factor in a microcavity Brillouin laser"
Optica 7, 1150-1153 (2020)

Boqiang Shen*, Lin Chang*, Junqiu Liu*, Heming Wang*, Qi-Fan Yang*, Chao Xiang, Rui Ning Wang, Jijun He, Tianyi Liu, Weiqiang Xie, Joel Guo, Dave Kinghorn, Lue Wu, Qing-Xin Ji, Tobias J. Kippenberg, Kerry Vahala, John E. Bowers
"Integrated turnkey soliton microcombs"
Nature 582, 365–369 (2020)
DARPA News
UCSB Press Release
EPFL Press Release
Caltech News

Chengying Bao*, Zhiquan Yuan*, Heming Wang, Lue Wu, Boqiang Shen, Keeyoon Sung, Stephanie Leifer, Qiang Lin, and Kerry Vahala
"Interleaved difference-frequency generation for microcomb spectral densification in the mid-infrared"
Optica 7, 309-315 (2020)

Heming Wang*, Yu-Hung Lai*, Zhiquan Yuan*, Myoung-Gyun Suh, Kerry Vahala
"Petermann-factor sensitivity limit near an exceptional point in a Brillouin ring laser gyroscope"
Nature Communications 11, 1610 (2020)
Nature Communications Comment

Lin Chang*, Weiqiang Xie*, Haowen Shu*, Qifan Yang, Boqiang Shen, Andreas Boes, Jon D. Peters, Warren Jin, Songtao Liu, Gregory Moille, Su-Peng Yu, Xingjun Wang, Kartik Srinivasan, Scott B. Papp, Kerry Vahala, John E. Bowers
"Ultra-efficient frequency comb generation in AlGaAs-on-insulator microresonators"
Nature Communications 11, 1331 (2020)

Liron Stern, Jordan R. Stone, Songbai Kang, Daniel C. Cole, Myoung-Gyun Suh, Connor Fredrick, Zachary Newman, Kerry Vahala, John Kitching, Scott A Diddams, Scott B. Papp
"Direct Kerr frequency comb atomic spectroscopy and stabilization"
Science Advances 6, eaax6230 (2020)

Yu-Hung Lai*, Myoung-Gyun Suh*, Yu-Kun Lu, Boqiang Shen, Qi-Fan Yang, Heming Wang, Jiang Li, Seung Hoon Lee, Ki Youl Yang, Kerry Vahala
"Earth rotation measured by a chip-scale ring laser gyroscope"
Nature Photonics 14, 345-349 (2020)
Nature Photonics News and Views