Experimental study on tandem pumped fiber amplifier

We present the experimental results of a 1083 nm fiber amplifier tandem pumped by 1030 nm fiber laser. The output characteristics of the tandem pumped amplifier with cladding-pump and core-pump schemes are both investigated. The 1083 nm signal laser has not been efficiently amplified when cladding-pumped by 1030 nm laser for the weak absorption of the gain fiber. The core-pump scheme works well with the amplifier. The output properties with different gain fiber length are experimentally investigated. The maximum output power is 2.4 W with power conversion efficiency of 60%.     

High-power continuous-wave output of master oscillator power amplifier system at 1053 and 1083 nm

We report the efficient generation of high-power laser radiation at 1053 and 1083 nm wavelength by using of a hybrid master oscillator fiber power amplifier system, consisting of a diode-pumped Yb-doped oxyorthosilicate solid state laser as the master oscillator and an Yb-doped large-mode-area fiber as the power amplifier. Efficient tunable diode-pumped Yb-doped oxyorthosilicate lasers at 1053 and 1083 nm have been constructed, which was scaled up to a maximum output power of 34.5 W at 1053 nm and 30.2 W at 1083 nm by a fiber power amplifier, corresponding to a slope efficiency of 93.9 and 87.8%, respectively.     

High efficiency, dual-wavelength fibre Raman pump laser for U-band fibre Raman amplifiers

A dual-wavelength, continuous wave, high efficiency fibre Raman ring laser for pumping U-band (1625–1675 nm) fibre Raman amplifiers is demonstrated. Two fibre Bragg gratings were used as wavelength-selective elements resulting in lasing lines at 1529.7 and 1558.7 nm with respective maximum powers of 209.0 and 390.9 mW. A simple U-band Raman amplifier was constructed to test the dual-wavelength pump laser and on:off gain with a peak of 7.3 dB and a 3-dB bandwidth of 73 nm was obtained.     

窄线宽光纤激光器在1 030 nm波段实现3 kW近衍射极限输出

基于大模场面积掺镱光纤搭建了全光纤1 030 nm高功率窄线宽光纤激光主振荡功率放大系统,实现了3 004 W的最高功率输出,斜率效率69.27%,是目前报道的输出功率最高的1 030 nm波段近衍射极限光纤激光器。最高输出功率时,x,y方向的光束质量因子分别为1.169,1.174,3 dB光谱宽度为0.18 nm,放大自发辐射抑制比达到37 dB。     

Frequency doubling of a fibre-amplified 1083 nm DBR laser

A good frequency standard is required at 1083 nm for measurements on the fine structure of helium and of the fine structure constant. Several milliwatts of CW frequency-doubled light offers the prospect of stabilisation to a Doppler-free hyperfine transition in molecular iodine. The 1083 nm emission of an extended-cavity DBR diode laser has been amplified using an ytterbium-doped fibre amplifier, and applied to a type-I phase matched Mg:LiNbO₃ crystal in a high-Q fundamental-resonant cavity for frequency doubling. The amplifier gain at 1083 nm under typical operating conditions was 13.8 dB, with a coherent output power up to 63 mW, limited by the maximum signal input power. The doubling cavity Q was , and about 70% of the incident power was coupled in. The maximum 2nd-harmonic conversion efficiency exceeded 20% and provided an output power of 3.7 mW for making continuous frequency scans of up to 600 MHz in the green. An optical spectrum analyser at 541.5 nm showed fringes of 4.6 MHz full width half maximum, close to the instrumental width. Received: 25 February 1998 / Revised and Accepted: 28 May 1998     

Output power improvement in an Yb-doped fiber laser with an additional unpumped Yb-doped fiber

Master oscillator power amplifier (MOPA) technology has been widely used in high-power or ultrashort-pulse fiber laser systems because the shape of the laser pulse can be easily adjusted. Usually, the first amplification stage of a 1064 nm fiber laser uses the core-pumped Yb-doped fiber amplifier (YDFA); however, the gain or output power is limited owing to the strong amplifier spontaneous emission (ASE) in the 1030 nm band. This paper presents the improved output power in an YDFA by inserting an additional unpumped Yb-doped fiber, which absorbs the lost backward ASE emitted from the pump end. We achieved an output power increase of more than 10% in a low-power signal, and the increase in output power decreased as the signal power increased. Moreover, the insertion of an additional unpumped Yb-doped fiber restricted the unwanted 1030 nm lasing in a low-power signal.     

Noise characteristics of a high-power ytterbium-doped fibre amplifier at 1083 nm

Experimental results are reported for the noise characteristics of an Yb-doped fibre amplifier pumped at 975 nm, used as a booster of a low-noise narrow-linewidth single-frequency 1083-nm wavelength laser diode. The maximum output power of the amplifier is 1.2 W with a gain larger than 30 dB. An increase of the intensity-noise spectral density relative to the signal, by approximately 6.5 dB, is introduced by the amplification process, due to signal-amplified spontaneous-emission (ASE) beat noise. A remarkable increase of the noise level with decreasing frequency is observed below ≈35 kHz, probably due to technical noise of the amplifier pump diodes. The spectral broadening due to amplifier phase noise was measured to be less than 300 Hz with a 5-kHz-linewidth Nd:YAG laser and that for the 300-kHz-linewidth diode laser at 1083 nm is therefore expected to be in the same range. Received: 5 October 1999 / Revised version: 2 December 1999 / Published online: 24 March 2000     

A 980 nm Yb-doped single-mode fibre laser with 946 nm Nd:YAG laser as pump source

Based on rate equations,this paper gives expressions of the output power,the pump power threshold,the slope efficiency,the fibre optimal length and the laser gain of a quasi-three-level Yb-doped fibre laser.The gain relationship between quasi-three-level system and four-level system is also given,which provides a theoretical basis for suppressing the four-level transmissions.In the experiment,we adopt the backward pumping configuration and use a linear cavity.The Yb-doped fibre laser has an output power of 372 mW of single-mode laser emission at 980 nm with a slope efficiency of 21.2% when the fibre length is 29.5 cm close to an optimal fibre length in theory.The experimental results accord well with the theoretical analyses.     

Tm:Ho co-doped single mode optical fibre laser pumped by a 1600 nm Er fibre laser

An all-fibre Tm:Ho laser system is reported, using a 1600 nm Er fibre pump laser and 0.3 m length of the fibre through a two-stage optimization of both the pump source and laser configuration to achieve a low threshold operation. As a result a low threshold power of 33 mW and a slope efficiency of 0.6% have been achieved, in laser operation at a wavelength of 1870 nm and a cross-comparison with 785 nm laser diode pumping has been made.     

Coherent beam combining of hybrid phase control in master oscillator-power amplifier configuration

A novel scalable architecture for coherent beam combining with hybrid phase control involving passive phasing and active phasing in master oscillator-power amplifier configuration is presented. Wide-linewidth mutually injected passive phasing fibre laser arrays serve as master oscillators for the power amplifiers, and the active phasing using stochastic parallel gradient descent algorithm is induced. Wide-linewidth seed laser can suppress the stimulated Brillouin scattering effectively and improve the output power of the fibre laser amplifier, while hybrid phase control provides a robust way for in-phase mode coherent beam combining simultaneously. Experiment is performed by active phasing fibre laser amplifiers with passive phasing fibre ring laser array seed lasers. Power encircled in the main-lobe increases1.57 times and long-exposure fringe contrast is obtained to be 78% when the system evolves from passive phasing to hybrid phasing.     

Polymer optical fibre Bragg gratings based fibre laser

For the first time the fibre laser constructed from a polymer optical fibre Bragg grating is reported. The single frequency laser with the peak power of −5 dBm and signal to noise ratio greater than 45 dB has been achieved. Further examination demonstrates the excellent characteristics of the fibre laser. First, the fibre laser can be easily tuned over 35 nm by the simple axial tension method. Second, the fibre laser has the high strain sensitivity of 1.48 pm/με with the dynamic measurement range as large as 2.37%.     

Review on recent progress on Yb-doped fiber laser in a variety of oscillation spectral ranges

We present review on recent progress on high power Yb-doped fiber laser in a variety of oscillation spectral ranges. According to Kurkov (Laser Phys. Lett. 2006), the oscillation spectral range of YDFLs can be divided into three bands: convenient (C-band), short (S-band), and long (L-band). For the C-band YDFL, tandem-pumped high power radiation by using 1018 nm fiber laser or 1030 nm thin-disk laser is reviewed. For the S-band YDFL, three mainly technical solutions, i.e., special designed fiber, the employment of photonic crystal fiber (PCF), and tandem pumping using 930 nm Nd-doped fiber laser are presented. For the L-band laser, active heating or self-heating the active fiber can help the long-wavelength oscillation. Fiber Raman laser or amplifier can also boost the power of L-band YDFL up. Some discussions and prospective predictions are proposed at the end of this paper.     

Ytterbium doped phosphate glass photonic crystal fiber laser

We demonstrate the 3% mol ytterbium doped phosphate glass air-clad photonic crystal fibre (PCF) laser of 43-cm length in single-mode operation. The fabrication and testing of the laser is introduced. The laser has the diameter of the core of 12 μm created in photonic microstructure and generates at wavelength of 1030 nm. Near 4-W output power and 14.6% slope efficiency against the launched pump power is demonstrated in preliminary characterization. The difference of refractive indices achieved in doped and undoped glass is Δn = 0.0004. We used the doped glass with the negative core-cladding Δn to assure the photonic crystal fibre way of single-mode propagation.     

60-W average power in 810-fs pulses from a thin-disk Yb:YAG laser

We demonstrate a passively mode-locked diode-pumped thin-disk Yb:YAG laser generating 810-fs pulses at 1030 nm with as much as 60 W of average output power (without using an amplifier). At a pulse repetition rate of 34.3 MHz, the pulse energy is 1.75 microJ and the peak power is as high as 1.9 MW. The beam quality is close to the diffraction limit, with M2 < 1.1.     

Theoretical study and optimization of a high power mid-infrared erbium-doped ZBLAN fibre laser

Based on the rate equations describing the erbium-doped fluoride glass(ZBLAN) fibre lasers with different pumping configurations being taken into account,this paper presents theoretical calculations related to the dynamic population density and the operation performance of a high power mid-infrared all-fibre erbium-doped ZBLAN fibre laser.It shows that the ground-state absorption,excited-state absorption and energy-transfer-upconversion processes co-exist and produce a population balance,causing the laser to operate stably at a continuous wave state.A good agreement between the theoretical results and recent experimental measurement is obtained.Furthermore,the laser structure parameters including fibre length,reflectance of output fibre Bragg grating and pumping configurations are quantitatively optimised to achieve the best performance.The results show,as expected,that the slope efficiency of the fibre laser can be improved significantly through optimisation,which then provides an important guide for the design of high-performance mid-infrared erbium-doped ZBLAN fibre lasers.     

高功率、低量子亏损同带抽运掺镱光纤放大器

开展了基于同带抽运的高功率、低量子亏损的掺镱光纤放大器实验研究. 搭建了一台输出功率为21 W的1018 nm短波 长掺镱光纤激光器, 并利用其对双包层掺镱光纤进行同带抽运, 获得18.6 W的1080 nm波段激光输出, 光-光转换效率高达90.86%. 关键词： 光纤放大器 同带抽运 双包层光纤 转换效率     

基于SOA和级联取样光纤光栅的多波长激光器

研究了基于半导体光放大器(SOA)和双段级联取样光纤光栅构成的新型结构多波长激光器.设 计了取样光纤光栅，计算了其反射谱，模拟了多波长激光器的输出光谱.基于自行制作的SOA 和取样光纤光栅，进行了多波长激光器的实验研究，得到了间隔为0.8nm、输出功率不平坦 度小于1.0dB的11个波长输出.理论和实验两个方面都可以验证：与基于普通取样光栅的多波 长方案相比，基于双段级联取样光栅的方案能改善输出谱平坦度，并可提高可激射波长数. 关键词： 半导体光放大器 取样光纤光栅 多波长激光器     

(1+1)型长距离侧面泵浦光纤实现17.4 kW激光输出

长距离侧面泵浦激光光纤在泵浦光注入、热管理、非线性抑制等方面具有天然优势,是实现高功率激光输出的有效途径。研制了（1+1）型长距离侧面泵浦激光光纤,采用1018 nm同带泵浦反向注入方式实现了17.4 kW激光输出,斜率效率为82.1%,3 dB线宽为1.3 nm,拉曼抑制比为37.8 dB。研究结果展示了长距离侧面泵浦光纤作为数十千瓦光纤激光放大器增益介质的巨大应用潜力。     

Semiconductor optical amplifier based swept wavelength source at 1060 nm using a scanning Fabry-Perot filter and an YDFA-based booster amplifier

We demonstrate a tuneable laser operating in the 1-1.1 μm wavelength region with a tuning range of 43 nm (FWHM), an output power of 19 mW and coherence length of 14 mm. The source is based on a master laser consisting of a cavity tuned ring configuration with a fibre Fabry-Perot filter used as a tuning element and a semiconductor amplifier as gain medium. The output of the master laser is subsequently power boosted using an Ytterbium doped fibre amplifier (YDFA). In addition to providing a power boost, we demonstrate that by tailoring the gain spectrum of the YDFA it is possible to increase the FWHM scanning range by 7 nm compared to that of the master laser.     

LD端面泵浦Nd：YLF激光放大器研究

描述了对高功率LD端面泵浦Nd：YLF激光放大器的研究。放大器的耦合结构采用微透镜对泵浦光进行准直,透镜导管（Lensduct）对其汇聚,耦合效率达72.2%。用该放大器构成的振荡器的斜效率为35.9%。该激光放大器的口径为Φ 10mm,在1053nm处具有2.66的小信号增益。