Diode-pumped, chirped-pulse Yb:S-FAP regenerative amplifier for laser-Compton X-ray generation

We present a diode-pumped, chirped-pulse Yb:S-FAP regenerative amplifier. This regenerative amplifier was developed as a first amplifier in an all-solid-state Yb:S-FAP laser system for laser-Compton X-ray generation. The amplifier delivers pulse energies above 24 mJ at a repetition rate of 50 Hz. Pulse compression reduces pulse widths to approximately 2.0 ps.     

30-mJ, diode-pumped, chirped-pulse Yb:YLF regenerative amplifier

A diode-pumped chirped-pulse regenerative amplifier with a cooled Yb:YLF crystal has been developed. The output pulse energy is 30 mJ at 20-Hz repetition rate. A high effective extraction efficiency of 68% is obtained, which is attributed to reduced saturation fluence at low temperature and to a high effective pulse energy fluence during regenerative amplification. After pulse compression by use of a parallel grating pair, 18-mJ pulse energy and 795-fs pulse duration are obtained.     

Sub-picosecond pulses at 100 W average power from a Yb:YLF chirped-pulse amplification system

We present a high-repetition-frequency, diode-pumped, and chirped-pulse amplification system operating at 106 W average output power with excellent beam quality (M(2)=1.3), based on cryogenically cooled Yb:YLF. 1 nJ seed pulses, derived from a mode-locked Ti:sapphire laser, are first amplified to 1 mJ pulse energy at 10 kHz repetition frequency in a regenerative amplifier. The second-stage, multipass amplifier increases the pulse energy to 10.6 mJ, resulting in a spectral width of 2.2 nm. The pulses are compressed to 865 fs in duration, which is 1.26 times the transform limit.     

Broadband spectral shaping in a Ti:sapphire regenerative amplifier

A birefringent crystal quartz plate of known thickness has been used as a spectral filter for spectral shaping in a Ti:sapphire regenerative amplifier. The spectral profile of the amplified pulse ejected from the regenerative amplifier was observed while adjusting the birefringent crystal plate in the cavity. By altering the gain spectrum, the bandwidth of the regeneratively amplified pulse was increased from 18 to 35 nm by using a 0.34-mm thick birefringent plate. The output pulse spectrum from the regenerative amplifier neared the bandwidth of the seed pulse. As a comparison, we used a coated filter outside the regenerative amplifier cavity, and the bandwidth of the regeneratively amplified pulse was stretched to 28 nm. When the bandwidth was stretched to 35 nm, the pulse was compressed to 35 fs.     

High-energy diode-pumped picosecond regenerative amplification at 999 nm in wavelength with a cryogenically cooled Yb:LuLiF(4) crystal

A diode-pumped, cryogenically cooled Yb:LuLiF(4) regenerative amplifier has been developed for the first time to our knowledge. A chirped-seed pulse was amplified and compressed in the regenerative amplifier, simultaneously, which generated approximately 6 mJ, 13 ps pulses at 999 nm in wavelength without a pulse compressor. Simultaneous lasing at 999 and 1024 nm, respectively, was demonstrated, which could be used for different frequency generation in the terahertz region.     

High-dynamic range pulse-contrast measurements of a broadband optical parametric chirped-pulse amplifier

We report on the pulse contrast-ratio characterization of a few-cycle 0.2 TW optical parametric chirped pulse amplifier system operating at 20 Hz. A specially designed third-order correlator was used to characterize and optimize the contrast of the system. We demonstrate that the pulse contrast depends much more on the temporal overlap between the pump and the seed pulse than the shape of the amplified spectrum. The best amplified pulse contrast-ratio was 10^-4 at Δt=±25 ps and >10^-9 at Δt=±150 ps delays. PACS 42.65.Vj; 42.65.Re     

Ti:sapphire Regenerative Amplifier at 1.056 μm

The design and performance of a Ti:sapphire regenerative amplifier operating at 1. 056 μm are described. A laser pulse with an initial pulsewidth of 100 fs is amplified to ≥1.5 mJ in the amplifier after firstly stretched to 850 ps. The amplified pulse can be re-compressed to ～300 fs with energy of ～1 mJ. Loss of the spectrum happens in the regenerative cavity since bandwidth of the coat of optics in the cavity is not enough adequate.     

Millijoule pulse energy picosecond fiber chirped-pulse amplification system

The efficient generation of a 1.17-mJ laser pulse with 360 ps duration using an ytterbium (Yb)-doped fiber amplifier chain seeded by a homemade mode-locked fiber laser is demonstrated experimentally.A specially designed figure-of-eight fiber laser acts as the seed source of a chirped-pulse amplification (CPA) system and generates mode-locked pulses with hundreds of picosecond widths.Two kinds of large-mode-area (LMA) double-clad Yb-doped fibers are employed to construct the pre-amplifier and main amplifier.All of the adopted instruments help avoid severe nonlinearity in fibers to raise sub-nanosecond pulse energy with acceptable signal-to-noise ratio (SNR).The output spectrum of this fiber-based CPA system shows that amplified spontaneous emission (ASE) is suppressed to better than 30 dB,and the onset of stimulated Raman scattering is excluded.     

High-energy femtosecond Yb-doped all-fiber monolithic chirped-pulse amplifier at repetition rate of 1 MHz

A high-energy femtosecond all ytterbium fiber amplifier based on a chirped-pulse amplification(CPA) technique at a repetition rate of 1 MHz seeded by a dispersion-management mode-locked picosecond broadband oscillator is studied.We find that the compressed pulse duration is dependent on the amplified energy,the pulse duration of 804 fs corresponds to the maximum amplified energy of 10.5 μJ,while the shortest pulse duration of 424 fs corresponds to the amplified energy of 6.75 μJ.The measured energy fluctuation is approximately 0.46% root mean square(RMS) over 2 h.The low-cost femtosecond fiber laser source with super-stability will be widely used in industrial micromachines,medical therapy,and scientific studies.     

高能量环形长腔再生放大啁啾脉冲激光的研究

介绍了一种新型的高能量环形长腔再生放大器, 通过对谐振腔的模式分布进行计算, 建立了腔长为12 m的环形腔再生放大器, 在150 mJ的抽运能量下, 得到了单脉冲能量为20 mJ的放大激光输出, 对应的转化效率为13.3%, 其输出激光的能量远远超过了常规的再生放大器输出激光的单脉冲量. 放大激光的输出光谱为30 nm, 可以支持<40 fs的傅里叶转换极限脉宽. 关键词： 环形腔 再生放大 高能量     

基于大基模体积的10mJ飞秒钛宝石激光再生放大器

文章报导了基于大基模体积的高能量飞秒钛宝石激光再生放大器的设计与实验研究,在重复频率10 Hz、抽运能量60 mJ的激励下,得到了单脉冲能量17.4 mJ的种子脉冲放大结果,压缩后的脉冲宽度为40.6 fs,能量为13.9 mJ.借助于此大基模体积再生腔,仅增加一级多通放大,实现了峰值功率达1.9 TW飞秒激光脉冲输出.结果表明,大模体积再生放大不仅降低了后续放大对抽运能量的要求,也可以单独压缩实现再生腔直接输出10 mJ量级的飞秒激光脉冲,是大能量高峰值功率飞秒激光系统的优质前端.     

Development of a high-contrast,high-peak power,Ti:Sapphire/OPCPA laser system

We report on a high-contrast, high-peak power laser system, which combines both conventional laser amplification and optical parametric chirped pulse amplification (OPCPA) techniques. By employing an OPCPA system after a regenerative amplifier, we have enhanced the prepulse contrast by six orders of magnitude. A prepulse contrast of better than 4.4 × 10^?11 has been measured with a high-energy broadband pulse of 24 mJ at a 10 Hz repetition rate from the OPCPA system. With a subsequent four-pass Ti:sapphire amplifier, we have achieved an amplified energy of 279 mJ and an ultrashort recompressed amplified pulse duration of 23.5 fs. We also discuss the basic design aspects and present our preliminary experimental investigations for higher energy operation to a multijoule.     

Mid-infrared pulses generated from the mixing output of an amplified, dual-wavelength Ti:sapphire system

We demonstrate the generation of femtosecond mid-infrared pulses by direct difference-frequency mixing in a AgGaS(2) crystal of two intense pulses from a dual-wavelength oscillator that have been simultaneously amplified in a single regenerative amplifier. A pulse energy of as much as 1.6 muJ was achieved at wavelengths of 9-11 mum.     

Programmable dispersion compensation and pulse shaping in a 26-fs chirped-pulse amplifier

We have constructed a 26-fs chirped-pulse amplifier that incorporates a programmable liquid-crystal spatial light modulator in the pulse stretcher. The modulator serves a dual purpose. First, we apply frequency-dependent phase shifts to compensate for cubic, quartic, and nonlinear phase dispersion in the amplifier, which results in a reduction in pulse duration from 32 to 26 fs, in agreement with the transform limit of the amplified pulse spectrum. Second, we are able to produce high-fidelity compressed amplified shaped pulses by applying phase masks directly within the stretcher. Shaped pulse energies of greater than 1 mJ are routinely obtained.     

An Ultra-Broadband Spatially Dispersed Regenerative Amplifier Free from Spatial Chirp

An ultra-broadband Ti：sapphire regenerative amplifier based on spatially dispersed amplification is demonstrated experimentally. Departing from previous reports, a new design of the cavity gets the amplified pulse free from spatial chirp. Utilizing this new regenerative amplifier, chirped pulses with bandwidth （FWHM） of about 80 nm are obtained, and the bandwidth is limited only by that of the incident seed pulses.     

High energy and long pulse generation with high-birefringence photonic crystal fibre and laser-diode pumped regenerative amplifier

We report on the generation of a high energy and long pulse for pumping optical parametric chirped-pulse amplification (OPCPA) by a high-birefringence photonic crystal fibre (HB-PCF) and a laser-diode-pumped regenerative chirped pulse amplifier. Using the femtosecond pump pulse centred at 815~nm, a 1064~nm soliton pulse is produced in the HB-PCF. After injecting it into an Nd:YAG regenerative amplifier with the glass etalons, a narrow-band amplified pulse with an energy of $\sim $4~mJ and a duration of 235 ps is achieved at a repetition rate of 10~Hz, which is suitable for being used as a pump source in the 800~nm OPCPA system.     

Timing jitter in a kilohertz regenerative amplifier of a femtosecond-pulse Ti:Al(2)O(3) laser

We measure the timing error of femtosecond pulses amplified by a Ti:sapphire regenerative amplifier at a 1-kHz repetition rate by use of a modified cross-correlation technique. Linearly frequency-chirped amplified pulses are frequency mixed with transform-limited oscillator pulses. A shift in the sum frequency corresponds to the timing error of each amplified pulse relative to the oscillator pulses. The timing error was measured every 6 ms with approximately 1-fs resolution over a measurable range of 400 fs.     

Generation of synchronized signal and pump pulses for an optical parametric chirped pulse amplification based multi-terawatt Nd:glass laser system

Synchronized signal (650 ps) and pump (1.3 ns) pulses were generated using 4-pass geometry in a grating pair based pulse stretcher unit. The pump pulse has been further amplified in a high gain regenerative amplifier. This amplified pulse was used as the pump in an optical parametric chirped pulse amplification based Nd:glass laser system. As the chirped signal pulse and the pump pulse originated from the same oscillator, the time jitter between the pump pulse and the signal pulse can be <50 ps.     

Dual-wavelength chirped-pulse amplification system

We demonstrate a chirped-pulse amplification system that simultaneously amplifies two pulses from a dual-wavelength oscillator in a single regenerative amplifier. The two wavelengths can be tuned from 800 to 890 nm. The total energy of 1.5 mJ can be variably split between the two pulses. The pulses are 150 fs in duration and have 60-fs timing jitter.     

Efficient generation of 200 mJ nanosecond pulses at 100 Hz repetition rate from a cryogenic cooled Yb:YAG MOPA system

A diode-pumped Master Oscillator Power Amplifier (MOPA) laser system based on cryogenic cooled Yb:YAG has been designed, developed and its output performance characterised. The laser system consists of a fibre oscillator, an active mirror regenerative amplifier and a four pass main amplifier. 2.4 mJ, 10 ns, 100 Hz seed pulses from the fibre oscillator/regenerative amplifier arrangement were amplified up to pulse energies of over 200 mJ by using the four pass main amplifier arrangement. As a further study we have obtained an increased slope efficiency of 40% and an optical-to-optical efficiency of 30% using a pinhole vacuum spatial filter/image relay for laser mode control. With 1.8 mJ input seed pulses, output pulse energies of around 150 mJ were achieved.