Compact fibre-laser-pumped Ho:YLF oscillator–amplifier system

We developed a compact Ho:YLF oscillator–amplifier system in a novel setup to utilise the unpolarised pump power from a fibre laser efficiently, and produced 21.3 mJ at 1 kHz, with an M ² better than 1.1. The amplified energies agreed well with the predicted values from a two dimensional rotational symmetric amplifier model that we developed. The model considers upconversion losses and ground-state depletion, as well as the spatial distribution of the pump beam.     

High-power Tm-doped fiber distributed-feedback laser at 1943 nm

We report on high-power operation of a fiber distributed-feedback (DFB) laser fabricated from Tm-doped photosensitive alumino-silicate fiber and in-band pumped by an Er/Yb fiber laser at 1565 nm. The fiber DFB laser yielded up to 875 mW of single-ended output at 1943 nm on two orthogonally polarized modes for 3.5 W of absorbed pump power. Further scaling of the DFB laser output power was achieved with the aid of a simple Tm-doped fiber amplifier stage spliced directly to the DFB fiber without the need of an optical isolator. The maximum output power from the DFB laser and fiber amplifier was >3 W for a combined absorbed pump power of 8.1 W. The influence of thermal loading, owing to quantum defect heating in the Tm-doped core, on the output power and longitudinal mode behavior is discussed, and the prospects for further improvement in performance are considered.     

Optimum design of erbium-ytterbium codoped fibres for large-signal, high-pump-power applications

A comprehensive numerical fibre amplifier model has been used to optimise erbiumytterbium codoped active fibre for maximum gain and quantum conversion efficiency at large signal operation. The optimum cut-off wavelength of the LP₁₁ mode has been found to increase from 800 nm at low pump powers (≈ 50 mW) to 1400 nm at pump powers higher than 500 mW. While at low pump powers fibres with higher numerical aperture give higher quantum conversion efficiency, at high pump levels better large signal performance is achieved with fibres having lower numerical aperture. Presented at the 1st Czech-Chinese Workshop “Advanced Materials for Optoelectronics”, Prague, Czech Republic, June 13–17, 1998.     

Design of 1480-nm diode-pumped Er3+-doped integrated optical amplifiers

Abstact Erbium-doped Y₂O₃ integrated optical amplifiers are designed for low-threshold operation and 3 dB amplification. The most important design parameter for minimal threshold, the erbium concentration, is found to have an optimum value of 0.35 at% for a given waveguide structure with 1.0 dB cm^-1 background loss. The corresponding threshold power is 7 mW. The pump power to obtain 3 dB gain is found to be 22 mW for an amplifier with an optimum erbium concentration of 0.6 at% and 2.8 cm length. At 30 mW pump power the maximum gain is shown to be 5 dB.Designing is done using a comprehensive numerical model of an erbium-doped integrated optical amplifier. In the model two-dimensional intensity-dependent overlap integrals are used, which allow arbitrary erbium dopant profiles and waveguide crosssections. Concentration-dependent effects such as quenching and upconversion are also included in the model.Input parameters for the model are determined from measurements on an unoptimized Er: Y₂O₃ optical waveguide amplifier. Amplification simulations and gain measurements of the unoptimized waveguides are found to be in close agreement, providing a sound basis for the design calculations.     

Cr:YAG laser pumped erbium-doped fibre amplifier with improved power characteristics

An erbium-doped fibre amplifier has been implemented with a 1.48 μm pumping from a Cr⁴⁺:YAG solid state laser. Record launched pump power of 256 mW and output power of 21.8 dBm with this type of pump laser have been obtained. Results are shown for a broad range of pump wavelength (24 nm) and signal wavelength (70 nm).     

Modeling of high-pressure 12-μm NH3 lasers

Experimental measurements of small-signal gain in an optically-pumped NH₃ amplifier are carried out at pressures ranging from 40 Torr to 760 Torr, and the results are used to validate a rate-equation model describing the amplifier dynamics. The gain measurements show that dilute mixtures of <0.5% NH₃ in N₂ are reqired to minimize the problems of gas heating due to pump absorption. The model is used to extrapolate the results to gas pressures of several atmospheres, and to demonstrate the potential for highpressure operation of optically-pumped NH₃ lasers. For a pump intensity of 100 MW/cm², calculations indicate that operation of an NH₃–N₂ laser is feasible up to a pressure of 10 atm, which would provide a maximum continuous tuning range of 4 cm^–1. High-resolution spectroscopy reveals that gain on a few NH₃ transitions is eliminated at high pressures due to the presence of overlapping absorptions in other NH₃ bands.     

Optical parametric chirped pulse amplification based on photonic crystal fibre

A compact two-stage optical parametric chirped pulse amplifier based on photonic crystal fibre is demonstrated.A 1064-nm soliton pulse is obtained in a home-made photonic crystal fibre (PCF) with femtosecond pulse pumping and then amplified to 2 mJ in an Nd:YAG regenerative amplifier.After the amplified pulses pass through the LBO crystal,the 532-nm double-frequency light with an energy of 0.8 mJ and a duration of over 100 ps at 10-Hz repetition rate is generated as a pump source in the following two-stage optical parametric amplification (OPA).The 850-nm chirped signal light gain from the stretcher is 1.5×10 4 in the first-stage OPA while it is 120 in the second-stage OPA.The total signal gain of optical parametric chirped pulse amplification (OPCPA) can reach 1.8×10 6.     

2.7-W Ho<Superscript>3+</Superscript>-doped silica fibre laser pumped at 1100 nm and operating at 2.1 μm

The basic performance characteristics of a Ho ³⁺-doped silica fibre laser that operates in a single transverse mode at ~2.1 µm and is pumped with the 1100-nm output from a free-running Yb ³⁺-doped silica fibre laser are presented. We measure a maximum slope efficiency (with respect to launched pump power) of 35% and we generate a maximum output power of 2.7 W at an optical-to-optical efficiency of 18% with respect to the incident pump power. The wavelength of the output is length tuned from 2090 nm to 2100 nm when the a _absL product varies from 1.2 to 2.7. The use of the free-running output from a Yb ³⁺-doped silica fibre laser to pump the Ho ³⁺-doped silica fibre laser is very convenient and allows significant scaling of the output power.     

Continuous-wave Ho:GdVO4 laser pumped by Tm-doped fiber laser with a fiber Bragg grating at room temperature

We reported the Ho:GdVO₄ laser pumped by Tm-doped laser with a fiber Bragg grating. 2.03 W continuous-wave Ho:GdVO₄ laser output power is obtained under 10.5 W incident pump power, with the optical-to-optical conversion efficiency and slope efficiency of 19.3% and 32.3%, respectively, at 7 °C. We can see that, the lower the temperature is, the better the laser output character is. The beam quality factor is M² ∼ 1.29 measured by the traveling knife-edge method.     

120 W high repetition rate Nd:YVO<Subscript>4</Subscript> MOPA laser with a Nd:YAG cavity-dumped seed laser

A master oscillator power amplifier (MOPA) system in which the output from an end-pumped Nd:YAG oscillator cavity dumped at 500 kHz is scaled up by a four-stage Nd:YVO₄ amplifier is reported. Decrease in extraction efficiency of the amplifier chain with crystals different from that in the oscillator was analyzed. With the 5.4 W seed output, 118 W of power was extracted from the amplifier chain at the pump power of 345 W, with an extraction efficiency of 34.2% and an overall optical–optical efficiency of 30.9% for the MOPA system. The beam quality factors were measured as M _x ²=1.45 and M _y ²=1.59 in two orthogonal directions, respectively.     

掺Tm激光晶体的可见与红外发光转换及双稳多色开关

理论研究了648nm激光抽运掺Tm晶体的可见与红外发光转换和发光双稳特性.根据系统的耦合速率方程理论,推导了发光转换阈值的解析表达式,数值研究了Tm³⁺能级布居数,辐射光谱以及发光强度等随抽运光强的变化.数值结果表明,648nm激光抽运下可以实现452/469nm蓝光与1716 nm红外光谱的发光转换.在光子雪崩阈值附近,可以观察到掺Tm晶体的辐射光谱双稳,荧光色度双稳和发光强度双稳等现象.利用掺Tm晶体的可见与红外发光转换与双稳特性,可以实现抽运功率控制的全固态发光转换器和双稳波长 关键词： 光学双稳 多色开关 掺Tm晶体 光子雪崩     

High-energy Ho:LLF MOPA laser system using a top-hat pump profile for the amplifier stage

Numerical simulations show the advantage of using a top-hat intensity profile pumping the amplifier stage in an Ho:LuLiF₄ (Ho:LLF) master oscillator power amplifier (MOPA) configuration over a Gaussian pump profile: higher pulse energies could be generated simultaneously with reduced peak fluence in Q-switched operation. In the experimental implementation, the top-hat beam was realized with a coherent beam transformation of the non-absorbed pump beam transmitted by the oscillator to pump the amplifier stage. The Ho:LLF MOPA produced 103.6 mJ at a repetition rate of 100 Hz with a pulse duration of 30 ns at a wavelength of 2053 nm, which corresponds to an optical-to-optical efficiency of 12.9 %. The beam quality was nearly diffraction limited (M ² = 1.03).     

Experimental study of a broad-band XeCl double-pass amplifier with SBS mirror

An oscillator-amplifier XeCl laser system has been used to experimentally investigate the effectiveness of a liquid stimulated Brillouin scattering (SBS) mirror for correcting the spatial aberrations of broad-band laser radiation in a double-pass amplifier. It has been found that the SBS amplifier performance is strongly dependent on the intensity I _p exciting the Brillouin medium. A good beam reconstruction has been attained at I _p1GW/cm², whereas highly aberrated output beams have been delivered by the SBS amplifier for I _p>1 GW/cm². By comparing the broad-band SBS amplifier performance to that of the same amplifier with a dielectrically coated flat mirror at one end, it has been found that the use of a SBS mirror is advantageous to obtain lower divergence output beams only for low energy pump beams (<1 mJ).     

All-fiberized Tm-doped fiber MOPA with 30-W output power

We demonstrate a 30-W all-fiberized laser in a master oscillator power amplifier(MOPA) structure with a central wavelength of 1 950 nm.The laser is a continuous-wave(CW) operation with double-clad Tm-doped silica fiber pumped by pigtailed laser diodes with a central wavelength of 793 nm.The optical-to-optical efficiency of the MOPA system is 37.5% with respect to the total 80-W pump power.The maximal slope efficiency of the system is approximately 43%,which belongs to the main amplifier and exceeds the Stoke limit.No obvious amplified spontaneous emitting(ASE) is observed in the experiment,and the power can be scaled straightforwardly by improving the pump power.     

High-gain Tm-doped fluoride fiber amplifier

A diode-pumped Tm-doped fiber-optic amplifier that has a small-signal gain of >30 dB at 1870 nm is reported. Output pulses of up to 3-W peak power at a 1-60-kHz repetition rate can be generated by amplification of 20-40-ns laser diode pulses of up to 2-mW launched peak power. The output signal quality, i.e., the ratio of the output pulse energy and the total amplified spontaneous emission (ASE) output energy between two pulses, depends on the relative propagation direction of pump and signal and can be dramatically increased by choice of the correct propagation scheme. In the optimum pump geometry the pulse energy can be raised to as much as 20 times the ASE energy. This is the first report to the author's knowledge of fiber-optic amplification of short diode laser pulses near 1.9 microm with high repetition rates in Tm-doped fibers.     

水中受激布里渊散射微弱Stokes信号光的高增益放大

采用脉冲宽度为7.2 ns的种子光注入式倍频Nd:YAG脉冲激光器,以CS₂为放大介质,实验并理论研究了水中受激布里渊散射微弱Stokes光的信号增益随延迟时间、放大器池长、抽运光能量的变化规律. 结果表明,当抽运光脉冲相对信号光脉冲延迟进入放大器,且延迟时间为脉冲宽度的一半,抽运光能量略低于介质受激布里渊散射阈值,选择合适的放大器池长可获得最佳的信号增益. 适当选择抽运光能量,亦可实现微弱信号光的线性放大. 实验中采用独立双池放大系统,当水中Stokes信号光的能量为1 pJ时,信 关键词： 布里渊放大器 信号增益 延迟时间 抽运光能量     

Amplifying Characteristics of Er3+/Yb3+ Co-Doped Parallel-Cascaded Double Microring Resonators

Abstract

In terms of the coupled mode theory, formulas of the transfer function and the output power gain are presented for an Er³⁺/Yb³⁺ co-doped parallel-cascaded double microring resonator. Around the pump wavelength of 0.98 μm and the central signal wavelength of 1.55 μm, analysis is performed for the dependence of the output power gain on the pump power, signal power, dopant concentration, amplitude coupling ratio, and ring spacing. The results show that the output power gain of this device is much larger than that of the Er³⁺/Yb³⁺ co-doped waveguide amplifier with identical waveguide lengths. In the case of the amplitude coupling ratio κ = 0.064, ring spacing L₂ = 10π R, pump power P_p0 = 8 mW, signal power P_s0 = 37.2 μW, Er³⁺ ion concentration N_Er = 1 × 26 m^?3, and Yb³⁺ ion concentration N_Yb = 3 × 27 m^?3, the device can produce higher signal power gain from 11.9 dB even up to 70 dB.     

Blue laser emission by intracavity second harmonic generation in Nd:ASL pumped by a tapered amplifier laser diode stabilized by a volume Bragg grating

We present the diode pumping of a Nd:ASL (Sr_1-xLa_x-yNd_yMg_xAl_12-xO₁₉) crystal for second harmonic generation at 453 nm. We have developed a high-brightness pump source based on a tapered amplifier in an extended cavity with a volume Bragg grating for wavelength stabilization. A pump brightness of 110 MW cm^-2 sr^-1 is obtained with a linewidth lower than 80 pm at 798 nm. This laser source is used to pump a Nd:ASL crystal to obtain 300 mW at 906 nm and 53 mW at 453 nm by intracavity doubling with a LBO crystal. PACS  42.55.Xi; 42.55.Px; 42.65.Ky     

Comparison of Tm : ZBLAN and Tm : silica fiber lasers; Spectroscopy and tunable pulsed laser operation around 1.9 μm

Tm-doped ZBLAN and Tm-doped silica glass are compared spectroscopically and the fiber lasing of the Tm ³F₄³H₆ transition around 1.9 m in ZBLAN and silica fibers is compared. The spectroscopy of these materials indicates that Tm:ZBLAN possesses advantages over Tm:silica glass due to the lower phonon energies. The phonon energy in these glass hosts influences both the pump manifold lifetime, the Tm ³H₄, and the upper laser manifold lifetime, the Tm ³F₄. The maximum phonon energy in Tm:ZBLAN, 500 cm^-1 , compared to Tm:silica, 1100 cm^-1, leads to better Tm–Tm self quenching towards populating the Tm ³F₄, as well as better Tm ³F₄³H₆ quantum efficiency. A spectroscopic analysis using the Judd–Ofelt theory and measured lifetimes are used to assess the merits of Tm:ZBLAN over Tm:silica as a fiber laser material. Diode-pumped fiber lasing experiments show that Tm:ZBLAN possesses advantages over Tm:silica that are believed to be due to a lower phonon energy. Data is presented for launched pump energy versus laser energy, fiber length versus slope efficiency, and output mirror reflectivity versus slope efficiency. Tm:ZBLAN is demonstrated to possess higher slope efficiencies and lower thresholds, than Tm:silicate. A grating tuned Tm:ZBLAN laser is also demonstrated for tunable operation between 1.893 m and 1.955 m. PACS 42.55.Wd; 42.55.Xi; 42.62.Fi; 78.55.Qr     

Noise figure and gain temperature dependent of praseodymium-doped fiber amplifier by using rate equations

A theoretical study of the temperature dependent noise effects of praseodymium-doped fiber amplifiers (PEDFAs) has been examined. The Pr³⁺-doped ZBLAN fiber amplifier pumped at 1017 nm and Pr³⁺-doped GeGa-sulfied fiber amplifier pumped at 1028 nm are chosen. The temperature-dependent rate and propagation equation related to four-level system consideration which is based on the population difference among amplification levels has been used. The population difference depends on pump and signal powers, Boltzman factor K_B, cross-sections, noise figure (NF) and Pr³⁺ concentration. The numerical results obtained over the temperature range from −20 °C to + 60 °C are used to present an analytical expression for the signal gain and noise figure effects in PDFAs length and noise figure with input pump power. The amplified spontaneous emission (ASE) has been taken into account.