Mode-locked CW dye lasers

Mode-locking of CW dye lasers are described. Three different methods: active mode-locking by acoustic loss modulation, pumping with mode-locked pulses and passive mode-locking by a saturable absorber, all resulted in stable continuous trains of tunable mode-locked pulses of various duration. Best results were obtained using passive mode-locking by a saturable absorber. The pulse lengths for this case were measured by auto-correlation technique to be as short as 1.5 ps. Factors influencing the mode-locking and possible improvements are discussed.     

Bistable mirrors for self-pulsing lasers

In this letter it is suggested that self-pulsing lasers can be realized by using optical bistable elements as decoupling mirrors.     

位相共轭镜耦合到染料激光器中的频移现象

本文建议了一个测量位相共轭镜耦合到染料激光器后,当波长自扫描时,BaTiO_3晶体内的运动光栅的多普勒频移的方法,实验结果表明,多普勒频移Δf<0.2Hz.进一步的分析显示,多普勒频移不能解释朝长波方向扫描的波长自扫描现象.     

Mode-locked pulses of homogeneous gain lasers

We discuss a number of errors in a recent paper by Piche and Belanger concerned with an approximate solution to an integral equation satisfied by mode-locked pulses of a homogeneous gain laser. An alternative method of solution which is, in principle, exact is presented.     

Mode-locked lasers and ultrashort light pulses

This article reviews some aspects of the generation of very short optical pulses using mode-locked lasers, with the emphasis laid on pulsed laser systems. Active and passive mode-locking is discussed, and the problem of measuring ultrashort light pulses is considered. A survey of some commonly used sources and techniques for the generation of ultrashort light pulses follows. The paper concludes with a short account of limitations in the generation and propagation of these pulses.     

Ultrabroadband chirped mirrors for femtosecond lasers

We report on the performance of widely tunable femtosecond and continuous-wave Ti:sapphire lasers that use a newly developed ultrabroadband mirror set. The mirrors exhibit high reflectivity (R > 99%) and smooth variation of group delay versus frequency over a wavelength range from 660 to 1060 nm. Mode-locked operation with pulse durations of 85 fs was achieved from 693 to 978 nm with only one set of ultrabroadband mirrors.     

Analysis of high-reflectivity metal-dielectric mirrors for edge-emitting lasers

A metal-dielectric mirror is shown as a simple solution for high-reflectivity coatings on cleaved-facet edge-emitting lasers, as well as a means to provide wavelength stabilization and spectral filtering. We show, through the use of a simple SiO2/Ti/Au coating, reflectivities better than 90% and a 25% reduction in the 30-dB linewidth of the output spectrum. Wavelength filtering and varying reflectivities are described as the result of multiple reflections and a coupled-cavity effect.     

Mode-locked semiconductor disk lasers with weakly saturated absorbers

The effect of absorber saturation on pulse shaping was studied both numerically and experimentally in a semiconductor disk laser. It was found that steady-state mode locking can be achieved even with very weak saturation of the absorber when the pulse energy is well below the saturation energy of absorption. The study discloses for the first time the direct impact of absorber modulation depth on the pulse width. Numerical analysis confirms that partial bleaching of absorption is adequate for formation of stable mode locking in SDLs. The fast gain dynamics of the semiconductor medium approach the dynamics of a slow gain medium at low pulse energies and high repetition rates with a pulse period much shorter than the gain recovery time. The presented results are of practical importance for multigigahertz repetition rate lasers, indicating that sufficient pulse shaping can occur when the saturable absorber is not fully bleached.     

SBS mirrors for XeCl lasers with a broad spectrum

The stimulated Brillouin scattering threshold of focused broad-band XeCl laser radiation depends on the ratio of the coherence length to the Rayleigh range, which is affected by the transverse beam quality. With reduction of the focal length, the threshold decreases first and then reaches a nearly constant value. In addition, the energy reflectivity is increased. On the other hand, pulse shortening occurs and the phase conjugation fidelity is decreased. Separation of single lines from the structured XeCl laser spectrum improves the SBS efficiency.     

Mode-locked diode-pumped vanadate lasers operated with PbS quantum dots

The use of glasses doped with PbS nanocrystals as intracavity saturable absorbers for passive Q-switching and mode locking of c-cut Nd:Gd_0.7Y_0.3VO₄, Nd:YVO₄, and Nd:GdVO₄ lasers is investigated. Q-switching yields pulses as short as 35 ns with an average output power of 435 mW at a repetition rate of 6–12 kHz at a pump power of 5–6 W. Mode locking through a combination of PbS nanocrystals and a Kerr lens results in 1.4 ps long pulses with an average output power of 255 mW at a repetition rate of 100 MHz.     

Mode-locked pulse generation from an all-FMF ring laser cavity

Experimental generation of stable mode-locked pulses and cylindrical vector beams(CVBs), from an all fewmode fiber(FMF) ring laser is first reported, to the best of our knowledge. In this laser, a section of few-mode erbium-doped fiber(FM-EDF) is used as the gain medium. The FM-EDF is pumped by 976 nm laser with LP11 mode, which is simultaneously converted and multiplexed through a homemade hybrid device, i.e., wavelength division multiplexing-mode selection coupler(WDM-MSC). All the components in our experiment are connected using FMF. The resulted CVB pulses have a spectral width of 0.33 nm with a repetition rate of 30.58 MHz under the pump power of 340 m W. Moreover, both azimuthally and radially polarized CVBs were achieved with a high purity of 95%. This mode-locked CVB fiber laser with an all FMF configuration opens the way to manipulate the transverse mode in mode-locked fiber lasers.     

Online ef fective backscattering estimation for ring laser gyro

Lock-in phenomenon in ring laser gyroscopes is directly related to effective backscattering,which includes both backscattering and nonuniform loss.Effective backscattering often differs in different states and can only be reflected in a working state via online estimation in the working state.Moreover,effective backscattering can result in the intensity modulation of beams in the opposite directions.The effective backscattering parameters can be obtained by measuring the weak modulations in the intensity signals under different rotation rates and by using the curve-fitting method.This letter demonstrates the online estimation of backscattering.     

Mode-locked pulses in multi-atmosphere CO2 lasers

The present paper deals with AM mode locking of multiatmosphere CO₂ lasers. We measure the effective linewidth in the laser mixtures and deduce from these data the pulse width. The method is based on determining the maximum frequency shift from the synchronized frequency. The advantage of this method is that the results are not influenced by time constant of detector and display. The results were verified by direct measurements of the pulse widths in mixtures up till three atmospheres. The pulse widths and effective line widths of the P(20) transition are determined for the usual CO₂ laser mixture up till 6 atm. We observe that helium has a large effect on the pulse width. The width decreases with increasing helium percentage at all pressures investigated. We suggest that this has to do with the overlap of a sequence-band transition and that the effect of sequence bands depend ion the helium percentage.     

Theoretical investigation of chirped mirrors in semiconductor lasers

This paper reports a theoretical design of chirped mirrors in 1.3-μm double-section semiconductor lasers to achieve high reflectivity and dispersion compensation over a broad bandwidth. Analytic expressions for reflectivity, group delay and group delay dispersion are derived. We use for the first time chirped air/semiconductor layer pairs as mirrors for higher-order dispersion compensation in semiconductor lasers. Our optimised calculations demonstrate that the broad-band mirrors designed consist of a total of only 12 air/semiconductor layers and achieve a reflectivity higher than 99.8%, a smooth group delay and almost stable dispersion in the laser cavity over a 100-nm bandwidth. Due to a high index contrast of both types of the layers, n _l = 1, n _h~ 3.5, a high-reflectivity bandwidth of > 700 nm is obtained in 1.3-μm semiconductor lasers. We also compare our results with that of a commercial simulation program and show a good agreement between them. As a conclusion, we assume from the theoretical results that air/semiconductor layer pairs with varying thicknesses used at one end of double-section semiconductor lasers can lead to femtosecond optical pulse generation using mode-locking techniques. An erratum to this article can be found at .     

Self-modulation of the radiation from fiber lasers with microcavity mirrors

The domain of excitation of self-oscillations is experimentally studied in a system consisting of an erbium fiber laser and a microcavity. The dependences of the self-oscillation frequency on the parameters of the system are found. The features of the self-oscillations are analyzed for the case where the laser radiation simultaneously interacts with several microcavities.