紫外超短脉冲激光放大过程中脉宽压缩的方案设计

采用放电泵浦KrF准分子激光放大器放大波长为248.4nm的紫外超短脉冲激光。对于能量为0.7mJ、脉宽为550fs的输入脉冲,在光束直径保持10mm不变的条件下,能量放大到15mJ,脉宽展宽到1200fs。为了压缩输出脉冲宽度,分析了群速度色散和自相位调制效应对脉宽展宽的影响。利用棱镜对,采用4种不同的实验方案对脉冲引入负的线性频率啁啾,以补偿KrF准分子激光放大器CaF2窗镜中的群速度色散和自相位调制对脉冲引入的正的线性频率啁啾。结果表明:在放大器之前放置棱镜对的方式可以在保持输出脉冲能量为15mJ的同时,在棱镜对间距为110cm的条件下,将输出脉冲宽度压缩到370fs,输出波长为248.4nm、带宽为0.4nm。     

Environmentally stable ytterbium figure-of-eight fiber laser producing 177-fs pulses

Pulses of 177 fs and 1035 nm, with average power of 1.2 mW, have been generated directly from a passively mode-locked Yb-doped figure-of-eight fiber laser, with a nonlinear optical loop mirror for mode-locking and pairs of diffraction gratings for intracavity dispersion compensation. To our knowledge, these are the shortest pulses ever to come from a passively mode-locked Yb-doped figure-of-eight fiber laser. This represents a 5-fold reduction in pulse duration compared with that of previously reported passively mode-locked Yb-doped figure-of-eight fiber lasers. Stable pulse trains are produced at the fundamental repetition rate of the resonator, 24.0 MHz.     

Ultra-short pulse compression at 1065 nm in nonlinear photonic crystal fiber

A pulse compressor has been designed using a 13 mm highly nonlinear photonic crystal fiber to compress pulses centered at 1065 nm from 28 fs to 1.8 fs with a compression factor of 16.2. This compression is achieved by using a high level of energy and generating different orders of solitons without resorting to large values of fiber's dispersion.     

On duty cycle selection of RZ optical pulse to optimize the performance of dispersion compensated 10 Gbps single channel optical communication system using dispersion compensating fibers

We present results for duty cycle selection of optical RZ pulse to optimize the performance in 10 Gbps single channel dispersion compensated optical communication system. The system has link length of 240 km with two spans. Each of the spans consists of 120 km standard single mode fiber (SSMF) of 16 ps/nm/km, whose chromatic dispersion is compensated using pre-, post- and symmetrical-dispersion compensation schemes by 24 km dispersion compensating fiber (DCF) of −80 ps/nm/km. The performance of the three compensation schemes is compared by taking 8, 10, 12 and 14 dBm Er-doped fiber amplifier (EDFA) power levels in the link with a duty cycle range (0.1-0.9) of RZ optical pulse. The graphical results obtained show a relationship among the duty cycle, EDFA power and dispersion compensation scheme which predicts the best performing duty cycle case. To optimize performance of the system, we recommend in general, duty cycle less than 0.3 and EDFA power below 8 dB irrespective of compensation scheme. However, with post compensation duty cycle less than 0.7 and EDFA power below 12 dBm give optimum performance. The results conclude that for the high value of duty cycle, post dispersion compensation scheme should be used.     

Femtosecond pulse compression based on second harmonic generation from a frequency chirped pulse

A 49 fs pulse at the wavelength of 800 nm was converted to a 26 fs pulse at the wavelength of 400 nm by temporal stretching (frequency chirping) and second harmonic generation from a chirped pulse with subsequent compression. The energy conversion efficiency of 35% was achieved.     

Performance comparison of pre-, post- and symmetrical-dispersion compensation techniques using DCF on 40 Gbps OTDM system for different fibre standards

Various factors like polarization mode dispersion, non-linear effects, Kerr effect, second and third order dispersion impose limit on the performance (transmission distance, pulse broadening) of Optical Time Division Multiplexed (OTDM) transmission system. In this paper, the performance comparison of 40 Gbps OTDM transmission system with pre-, post-, and symmetrical-dispersion compensation techniques for different fibre standards has been carried out. It has been observed that for pre compensation, ITU 655 [D = 3.78 ps/nm/km] came to be best suitable fibre with the dispersion compensating fibre length of 2.36 km for maximum reach of 3000 km. For post- and symmetrical-compensation, the behaviour of alcatel [D = 8 ps/nm/km] is almost similar with maximum transmission distance of 3200 and 3050 km respectively.     

Enhanced near field mediated nanohole fabrication on silicon substrate by femtosecond laser pulse

Investigation of the process of nanohole formation on silicon surface mediated with near electromagnetic field enhancement in vicinity of gold particles is described. Gold nanospheres with diameters of 40, 80 and 200 nm are used. Irradiation of the samples with laser pulse at fluences below the ablation threshold for native Si surface, results in a nanosized surface modification. The nanostructure formation is investigated for the fundamental (λ = 800 nm, 100 fs) and the second harmonic (λ = 400 nm, 250 fs) of the laser radiation generated by ultrashort Ti:sapphire laser system. The near electric field distribution is analyzed by an Finite Difference Time Domain (FDTD) simulation code. The properties of the produced morphological changes on the Si surface are found to depend strongly on the polarization and the wavelength of the laser irradiation. When the laser pulse is linearly polarized the produced nanohole shape is elongated in the E-direction of the polarization. The shape of the hole becomes symmetrical when the laser radiation is circularly polarized. The size of the ablated holes depends on the size of the gold particles, as the smallest holes are produced with the smallest particles. The variation of the laser fluence and the particle size gives possibility of fabricating structures with lateral dimensions ranging from 200 nm to below 40 nm. Explanation of the obtained results is given on the basis simulations of the near field properties using FDTD model and Mie's theory.     

Optimizing amplifier spacing to improve performance in RZ-rectangular pulse based 10 Gb/s single channel dispersion managed optical communication system

In this paper, we optimize the inter-amplifier spacing in combination with duty cycle of RZ data format and EDFAs power so that link length of system can be maximized. The results for EDFA amplifier placement in 10 Gbps single channel dispersion managed optical communication system have been presented. By increasing the length of standard single mode fiber of dispersion 16 ps/nm/km in proportion to the increase in length of compensating fiber of dispersion −80 ps/nm/km, the pre-, post- and symmetrical-dispersion compensation schemes of the system have been compared. Further, schemes are observed at 8, 10 and 12 dBm values of EDFA power in the link with different duty cycle values of RZ optical pulse in the range of 0.2-0.8 with step size of 0.2 in relation to amplifier spacing to get lower value of bit error rate and timing jitter. The graphical results obtained show strong relationship among duty cycle of RZ optical pulse, EDFA power and, dispersion compensation scheme.     

Femtosecond pulse shaping for phase and morphology control in PLD: Synthesis of cubic SiC

Pulse shaping introduces the method that makes possible the production of tunable arbitrary shaped pulses. We extend this method to control the prevalent growth of cubic SiC films on Si (1 0 0) substrates by pulsed laser deposition at temperatures around 973 K from a SiC target in vacuum. We used a laser system generating 200 fs pulses duration at 800 nm with 600 μJ at 1 kHz. The obtained structures are investigated by electron microscopy, X-ray diffraction and profilometry. We observed grains embedded in an amorphous texture, characteristic in our opinion to the depositions obtained with very short pulses. We present a comparison of deposited films with and without pulse shaping. Pulse shaping promotes increased crystallization and results in the deposition of thin structures of cubic SiC with a strongly reduced density of particulates, under similar deposition conditions.     

Cross-phase modulation induced phase fluctuations in optical RZ pulse propagating in dispersion compensated WDM transmission systems

The basic mechanism of cross-phase modulation induced phase fluctuations in optical RZ pulse propagating in a periodically dispersion compensated transmission line has been investigated. Ordinary differential equations have been derived using variational analysis to estimate the phase fluctuation and the analytical result is verified by numerical simulations based on split-step Fourier method. We therefore explore the impact of different dispersion compensation maps on phase fluctuation for 10 Gb/s and 40 Gb/s WDM transmission systems. The effects of initial pulse spacing between channels, channel spacing and residual dispersion on phase shift have been studied. We find that cross-phase modulation induced phase fluctuation can be mitigated by proper adjustment of channel spacing and/or residual dispersion.     

Minimization of self-steepening of ultra short higher-order soliton pulse at 40 Gb/s by the optimization of initial frequency chirp

In this paper, the decay of first- and second-order ultra short pulses of the order of 50 fs due to self-steepening (SS) effect has been numerically investigated for a 40 Gb/s optical soliton system including the impact of third-order dispersion (TOD). It has been observed that the prechirp (both positive and negative) in the pulse can counteract the SS effect and improve compensation performance for the distortions .The critical positive prechirp value is found to be 1.4 and the negative prechirp is 1.2, beyond which the soliton pulse is unstable.     

Investigations on order and width of RZ super Gaussian pulse in pre-, post- and symmetrical-dispersion compensated 10 Gb/s optical communication system using standard and dispersion compensating fibers

We show the effect of varied order and width of super Gaussian pulse at 10 Gb/s in dispersion compensated optical communication system. The optical communication system consists of standard single-mode fiber of 16 ps/nm/km of a certain length, whose dispersion is compensated using pre-, post- and symmetrical-dispersion compensation schemes with proportionate length dispersion compensating fiber of −80 ps/nm/km. Performance of these three compensation schemes is compared at 14 dBm values of Er-doped fiber amplifiers (EDFA) power at 1st, 2nd and 3rd order RZ super Gaussian optical pulse. The pulse width, full width at half maximum (FWHM) is also varied from 5 to 30 ps to highlight the optimum performance. The graphical results obtained show a relationship among the attributes pulse width, order of RZ super Gaussian optical pulse and dispersion compensation scheme implemented. It shows that to decrease BER and timing jitter in the system, smaller width and 3rd order super Gaussian pulse should be used. It is recommended that to decrease dependency of BER and timing jitter in the communication system on the pulse width i.e. FWHM, the symmetrical compensation scheme should be implemented.     

Femtosecond pulse generation in a linear passive mode-locked dye laser

The femtosecond pulse generation in a c.w. pumped linear passive mode-locked rhodamine 6G-DODCI (3,3-diethyloxadicarbo cyanine iodide) dye laser is studied experimentally. Colliding pulse mode-locking (CPM) is achieved by placing the saturable absorber jet in the centre of the linear ring resonator. The laser performance is studied as a function of the saturable absorber concentration and of the absorber jet detuning from the central position (CPM position). Without a prism pair in the resonator pulse durations down to 140 fs were obtained. Detuning the absorber jet from the CPM position resulted in a trailing pulse tail ofcirca 900 fs duration. The dependence of the laser performance on the prism pair positioning is investigated experimentally and analysed theoretically. At the prism pair balanced position, stable pulses of about 50 fs duration were generated independent of the lateral detuning of the absorber jet out of the resonator centre. The dependence of the laser wavelength on the absorber concentration is compared with theoretical predictions. In an appendix the ray-tracing inside the linear resonator is simulated by an ABCD matrix calculation for Gaussian beams.     

Parametric study on femtosecond laser pulse ablation of Au films

Ablation process of 1 kHz rate femtosecond lasers (pulse duration 148 fs, wavelength 775 nm) with Au films on silica substrates has been systemically studied. The single-pulse threshold can be obtained directly. For the multiple pulses the ablation threshold varies with the number of pulses applied to the surface due to the incubation effect. From the plot of accumulated laser fluence N × ?_th(N) and the number of laser pulses N, incubation coefficient of Au film can be obtained (s = 0.765). As the pulse energy is increased, the single pulse ablation rate is increasing following two ablation logarithmic regimes, which can be explained by previous research.     

Ultraviolet laser microstructuring of silicon and the effect of laser pulse duration on the surface morphology

The study of the laser pulse duration effect on the silicon micro-spikes morphology is presented. The microcones were produced by ultraviolet (248 nm) laser irradiation of doped Si wafers in SF₆ environment. The laser pulse duration was adjusted at 450 fs, 5 ps and 15 ns. We have analyzed the statistical nature of the spikes’ morphological characteristics, such as periodicity and apex angle by exploiting image processing techniques, on SEM images of the irradiated samples. The correlation of the quantitative morphological characteristics with the laser parameters (pulse duration, laser fluence and number of pulses) provides new insight on the physical mechanisms, which are involved on the formation of Si microcones.     

Wave-breaking-extended fiber supercontinuum generation for high compression ratio transform-limited pulse compression

Wave-breaking often occurs when a short intense optical pulse propagates in a long normally dispersive optical fiber. This effect has conventionally been avoided in fiber (super-)continuum-based pulse compression because the accumulated frequency chirp of the output pulse cannot be fully compensated by a standard prism (or grating) pair. Thus, the spectral extending capability of the wave-breaking has not been utilized to shorten the compressed pulse. We demonstrate that wave-breaking-free operation is not necessary if a 4f pulse shaper-based compressor is employed to remove both the linear and nonlinear chirp of the output pulse. By propagating a 180 fs (FWHM) input pulse in a nonlinear photonic crystal fiber beyond the wave-breaking limit, we compress the wave-breaking-extended supercontinuum output pulse to the bandwidth-limited duration of 6.4 fs (FWHM). The combination of high compression ratio (28×) and short pulse width represents a significant improvement over that attained in the wave-breaking-free regime.     

Fabrication of micro-gratings on Au-Cr thin film by femtosecond laser interference with different pulse durations

We encoded surface relief micro-gratings on Au-Cr thin films using two-beam interference of femtosecond laser pulses with the durations from 25 fs to 70 fs. The dependence of the fabrication quality on the pulse duration has been investigated both numerically and experimentally. The results revealed that the shorter pulses were preferable to prepare periodical microstructures with minimal ablation fringe width and satisfied fabrication quality. This work has potential applications on periodic functional microstructures fabrication for ultra-fine processing and modification on various materials, especially for intractable materials.     

Optical emission spectroscopy investigation of an ultra-short laser induced titanium plasma reheated by a ns laser pulse

The dynamics of a titanium plasma species, induced in air by coupling a fs-ablating laser pulse with an orthogonal ns-reheating laser source placed at the fixed distance of 1.0 mm from the target surface, has been followed by temporally resolved emission spectroscopy. The temporal evolutions of plasma features such as excitation temperatures and electron densities have been evaluated by using two different laser energies of the first fs-ablating laser pulse (0.8 mJ and 3.0 mJ). Optimum inter-pulse delay times, experimentally determined, of 250 μs and 500 μs were used for the fs laser energy of 3.0 mJ and 0.8 mJ, respectively. By experimental inspections of the main plasma species electronic transitions so obtained, a strong enhancement was evaluated up to one and two orders of magnitude for Ti(I) and Ti(II), respectively. Independently from the fs laser energy employed, the plasma features showed the same temporal behaviour implying that the ns-reheating characteristics of this process belong to the reheating mechanism itself. The experimental results have been discussed and the excited species evolutions and elementary processes involved, as well as, the local thermodynamic equilibrium departures, have been outlined.     

Cr∶LiSAF飞秒激光器中Gires-Tournois镜的设计

飞秒激光脉冲的产生主要依赖于激光腔内净的负群延迟色散.但是在固体激光器中,增益介质和其它光学元件却引入了正色散,因此需引入相应的色散补偿机制.布儒斯特角棱镜对曾是激光腔中色散补偿的主要办法,但是它在进行群延迟色散补偿的同时还会引入高阶色散,使激光器操作困难并影响激光器的尺寸和重复频率.Gires-Tournois镜是一种新型的色散补偿元件,可以克服这些缺点.本文介绍了Gires-Tournois镜的基本结构,分析了影响Gires-Tournois镜的群延迟时间、群延迟色散和三阶色散的量,给出了Gires-Tournois镜的设计原则并根据Cr∶LiSAF飞秒激光器中的色散补偿要求设计了性能优良的Gires-Tournois镜.该Gires-Tournois镜在750~900 nm的波长范围内具有高于99.9%的反射率和-35±8fs2的群延迟色散.用这样的Gires-Tournois镜经过4次反射后可以补偿3mm的Cr∶LiSAF晶体的绝大部分群延迟色散.     

Kerr Lens Mode-locked Operation of Yb:KYW Laser

Using a modified ABCD-matrix approach accounting for nonlinear refraction in active medium,the ranges of cavity parameters that provide a mode-locking of Yb∶KYW-laser in usual z-fold cavity configuration are determined.Taking the cavity parameters that provide a most efficient mode locking and based on fluctuation model,a numerical simulation of laser operation is performed.In the calculations the side-band pump power of 6W at 982 nm is used in 1 cm length KYW crystal with 1 cm×0.005 cm beam cross section.Calculations show that self-starting operation is possible with these parameters and dispersion compensation allows for bandwidth-limited ultrashort pulse generation.The shortest pulse duration was determined to be about 200 fs with self-starting buid-up time of 130 μs.Such a built-up time is comparable and even shorter than that one for the lasers with semiconductor saturable absorbers.The region of negative dispersion provided by prism pair for a stable ultrashort pulse generation was determined to be (-17000～-42000)fs2.