Blue light generation in photonic crystal fibers with 1-μm femtosecond laser pulses

Using 300-fs 1039-nm Yb-doped fiber laser, we experimentally demonstrate blue light generation in a high-△ and high nonlinear photonic crystal fiber (PCF). The zero dispersion wavelength of PCF is 793 nm, detuning 245.8 nm from the pump wavelength. PCF allows a frequency conversion exceeding the octave of pump wavelength. The visible component of the measured output spectrum occurs in the fundamental mode and spans from 391.3 to 492.3 nm. The peak wavelength of 441.8 nm has a frequency detuning of 390 THz from the pump wavelength of 1039 nm.     

Stable multi-wavelength thulium-doped fiber laser based on all-fiber Mach–Zehnder interferometer

We propose and experimentally demonstrate a multi-wavelength thulium-doped fiber（TDF） laser based on all-fiber Mach–Zehnder interferometer（MZI） at 1.9 mm. Here a segment of 4 m single-mode TDF is pumped by 1568 nm fiber laser for 2 mm band optical gain. The MZI includes two cascaded 3 d B coupler. A segment of 3.5 m long un-pumped polarization-maintaining TDF and polarization controller（PC） are joined in the ring cavity to suppress the mode competition. Multi-wavelength lasers at 1.9 mm with wavelength number from one to four are obtained by adjusting the PC and the stability of output power of multi-wavelength fiber laser is analyzed.     

High OSNR and simple configuration dual-wavelength fiber laser with wide tunability in S+C+L band

A simple configuration dual-wavelength fiber laser,by combining the first-order Brillouin laser and the residual pump laser,is proposed and experimentally demonstrated.A 1 km long single-mode fiber is used as the stimulated Brillouin scattering gain medium pumped by a narrow linewidth tunable laser source(TLS).Through simply adjusting the TLS output power,power-equalized dual-wavelength lasing can be achieved with a high optical signal to noise ratio(OSNR) of 80 d B.With the good tunability of the TLS,the dual-wavelength fiber laser has a tunable range of ～130 nm,and simultaneously the beat frequency of the two lasing wavelengths can be tuned from 10.1875 to 11.0815 GHz with the tunable range of 0.8940 GHz.The high stability of the dualwavelength operation is experimentally verified by the measured beat frequency fluctuation of ≤6 MHz in 1 h and power fluctuation of ≤0.03 d B in 2 h.The temporal characteristics of the fiber laser are also investigated experimentally.The fiber laser will find good applications in fiber sensing and microwave photonics areas.     

Random Bragg-grating-based wavelength-tunable random fiber laser with a full-open cavity

A full-open-cavity wavelength-tunable random fiber laser(WT-RFL) with compact structure and hundreds of picometers tuning range is proposed and demonstrated. A π fiber Bragg grating(FBG) is used in the WT-RFL as a filter to select lasing wavelengths. The two random Bragg grating arrays(RBGAs) and a section of high gain erbium-doped fiber result in a low lasing threshold and high stability. A numerical model to analyze the tunable characteristics is developed. The results show that the laser threshold is 22 m W, and the maximum peak-power fluctuation is 0.55 d B. To the best of our knowledge, it is the first time that a compact and full-open-cavity WT-RFL with two RBGAs and a π-FBG is proposed.     

A theoretical and experimental investigation of an in-band pumped gain-switched thulium-doped fiber laser

In this paper,the theoretical rate equation model of an in-band pumped gain-switched thulium-doped fiber(TDF) laser is investigated.The analytical formulations of pump energy threshold,peak power extraction efficiency,and pulse extraction efficiency are derived through analyzing the interaction process between the pump pulse and the laser pulse.They are useful for understanding,designing,and optimizing the in-band pumped TDF lasers in a 1.9 μm-2.1 μm wavelength region.The experiment with an all-fiber gain-switched TDF laser pumped by a 1.558-μm pulse amplifier is conducted,and our experimental results show good agreement with theoretical analysis.     

Experimental Investigation of Chaos Synchronization in DFB Diode Lasers with Unsymmetrical Scheme

We experimentally generate high dimension chaotic waveforms with smooth spectrum using a distributed feedback （DFB） semiconductor laser with unidirectional fibre ring long-cavity feedback, and implement the stable chaos synchronization when the chaotic light is injected into a solitary DFB laser diode. The synchronization quality is investigated by time-domain and frequency-domain analysis separately, The frequency-domain analysis indicates that the synchronization has higher quality in the high frequency band. The influences of the injection strength and the frequency detuning on the synchronization are measured. Our experimental results show that the robust synchronization can be maintained with the optical frequency detuning from -11GHz to 40 GHz.     

High conversion efficiency,high power density Q-switched fiber laser

An acoustic-optic Q-switched all-fiber laser With a high-repetition-rate, a short pulse width, a wide spectrum, and a high conversion efficiency is experimentally demonstrated. In the laser configuration, a （1＋1）x 1 side-pumping coupler is introduced to perform backward pumping, and a 10/130%tm Yb fiber is adopted. The acoustic-optic component operates in the first direction, achieving a Q-switched pulse with a repetition rate adjustable in the range of 20 kHz-80 kHz. Under a repetition rate of 20 kHz and a pump power of 6.76 W, the fiber laser obtains a highly efficient and stable pulse output, with an average power of 4.3 W, a pulse width of 56 ns, a peak power of 3.83 kW, and a power density of 1.39x 101~ W/cm2. Particularly, the optic-optic conversion efficiency of the laser reaches as high as 64%. Another feature of the pulsed laser is that the high reflection mirror reflects the pump light as well, which brings the secondary absorption of the pump power into the gain fiber.     

Random Bragg-gratings-based narrow linewidth random fiber laser with a π-phase-shifted FBG

A new structure of short-cavity random fiber laser(RFL) with narrow linewidth lasing is proposed. Aπ-phase-shifted fiber Bragg grating(FBG) loop mirror was used in the RFL for spectral filtering and to suppress multi-mode oscillation due to the narrow transmission window. The random feedback of the RFL was implemented by a randomly dispersed weak reflection FBG array. The high gain of the erbium-doped fiber and a half-open cavity design results in a low lasing threshold. The linewidth of the laser was 225 Hz with58 d B side-mode-suppression ratio. The laser threshold was 4.5 mW, and the optical signal-to-noise ratio was up to 63 dB.     

Single-frequency,single-polarization ytterbium-doped fiber laser by self-injection locking

We demonstrated a stable single-frequency,single-polarization operation of ytterbium-doped fiber laser. As a novel practical method to realize single-polarization operation of fiber distributed Bragg reflector (DBR) laser,we proposed self-injection locking (SIL) with an active fiber ring feedback cavity.The laser has high output power exceeding 15 mW,wavelength of 1053.20 nm,and side-mode suppression ratio greater than 60 dB. The SIL fiber laser shows the improvements in output power and side-mode suppression compared with the fiber DBR laser.No mode-hopping is observed within 2 hours.     

Narrow Linewidth Tm^3＋-Doped Large Core Fiber Laser Based on a Femtosecond Written Fiber Bragg Grating

A diode laser （LD） clad-pumped narrow linewidth all-fiber Tm^3＋-doped fiber laser is reported with a maximal output power of 27W at 1.947μm. By successively splicing an LD pigtail fiber, a single-mode Tm^3＋-doped fiber, and a multi-mode Tm^3＋-doped fiber, the fiber laser has 70pm narrow linewidth output, and a high slope efficiency of nearly 47.5% with respect to the launched pump power. The high reflectivity fiber Bragg gratings, which are directly written into the single-mode Tm^3＋-doped fiber core by the 800nm femtosecond pulsed laser, act as the high reflectivity coupler. The output laser has diffraction-limited beam quality with a factor M^2 of 1.29, when the output laser power is nearly 27W.     

Mode-locked 2 μm fiber laser with a multi-walled carbon nanotube as a saturable absorber

We propose and demonstrate a passively mode-locked fiber laser operating at 1951.8 nm using a commercial thulium-doped fiber(TDF) laser, a homemade double-clad thulium–ytterbium co-doped fiber(TYDF)as the gain media, and a multi-walled carbon nanotube(MWCNT) based saturable absorber(SA). We prepare the MWCNT composite by mixing a homogeneous solution of MWCNTs with a diluted polyvinyl alcohol(PVA) polymer solution and then drying it at room temperature to form a film. The film is placed between two fiber connectors as a SA before it is integrated into a laser ring cavity. The cavity consists of a 2 m long TDF pumped by a 800 nm laser diode and a 15 m long homemade TYDF pumped by a 905 nm multimode laser diode. A stable mode-locking pulse with a repetition rate of 34.6 MHz and a pulse width of 10.79 ps is obtained when the 905 nm multimode pump power reaches 1.8–2.2 W, while the single-mode 800 nm pump power is fixed at 141.5 m W at all times. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first reported mode-locked fiber laser using a MWCNT-based SA.     

Ld-Clad-Pumped All-Fiber Tm^3＋-Doped Silica Fiber Laser

The CW 39.4 W all-fiber LD-clad-pumped Tm^3＋-doped fiber laser output is reported with a slope efficiency of 34% in respect to the pump power. The all-fiber laser is made up by progressively splicing the pigtail fiber, matched FBG fiber and Tin-doped fiber. The reflective FBG and Tm-doped fiber end fresnel reflection build up the laser resonance cavity. Due to the multi-mode FBG as the reflective mirror, the output laser spectrum is multi-peaks at high power output, whereas the total spectrum width is less than 2nm at nearly 1.94μm.     

Efficient loading of ultracold sodium atoms in an optical dipole trap from a high power fiber laser

We report on a research of the loading of ultracold sodium atoms in an optical dipole trap,generated by two beams from a high power fiber laser.The effects of optical trap light power on atomic number,temperature and phase space density are experimentally investigated.A simple theory is proposed and it is in good accordance with the experimental results of the loaded atomic numbers.In a general estimation,an optimal value for each beam with a power of 9 W from the fiber laser is achieved.Our results provide a further understanding of the loading process of optical dipole trap and laid the foundation for generation of a sodium Bose–Einstein condensation with an optical dipole trap.     

Multi-wavelength erbium-doped fiber laser using four-wave mixing effect in doped fiber

We demonstrate a multi-wavelength erbium-doped fiber laser (EDFL) using erbium gain and four-wave mixing (FWM) effect in a piece of erbium-doped fiber (EDF) with high erbium ion concentration. The EDF has a pump absorption rate of 24.6 dB/m at 979 nm and is bi-directionally pumped by 980-nm laser diodes. FWM effect redistributes the energy of different oscillating lines and causes multi-wavelength operation. The laser generates more than 22 lines of optical comb with a line spacing of approximately 0.10 nm at the 1569-nm region using only 1.5-m-long EDF.     

A high-efficiency Brillouin fiber ring laser

A high-efficiency Brillouin fiber ring laser is demonstrated using the standard single-mode fiber. The laser exhibits a 3.6-mW threshold. The output power is 22 mW with 40-mW pump power, and the maximum optical-to-optical efficiency is 5570. The output is single wavelength with a 3-dB linewidth of 5 MHz, and the interval of center frequency between the laser and the pump light is 11 GHz （0.088 nm）. It is shown that the stimulated Brillouin scattering threshold of ring resonator is lower and the energy transfer efficiency is higher than those in fiber.     

Theoretical and experimental study on rare-eath element-doped silicon single-mode fiber laser with two different structures of resonators

Abstract: Laser resonator is very important in the study and fabrication of lasers. The work conditions and work parameters of rare-earth element-doped optical fiber lasers with two different structures of laser resonators, i. e., the fiber ring resonator and Fabry-Perot resonator are studied. The fineness, laser resonant conditions, laser oscillation conditions and threshold inversion of these two different cavity are deduced. A series of experiments are also given. The result is very valuable to evaluate the output of optical fiber laser and can be a foundation of device fabrication. The Nd~(3 )-doped silica single-mode fiber laser pumped by Ar~ laser with a low threshold of 1.02 mW and a maximum output of more than 1 mW are presented in this paper.     

Study of mode propagation with 632.8-nm laser in tapered fiber

The material dispersion of a tapered fiber is described by Sellmeier＇s equation. The dependence of refractive index on wavelength and doping concentration is discussed. A He-Ne laser with the output wavelength of 632.8 nm is used in the experiment. When the cutoff frequency of the fiber is less than the laser frequency, the guiding modes of a singl~-mode fiber （at 1550 am） are investigated. The results show that the original single-mode fiber becomes a multi-mode waveguide. The propagation and mode coupling of the light in the taper region are analyzed. By controlling the taper end size of the fiber, the unique tapered fiber can convert a multi-mode beam into a single-mode one.     

Analytical formula of free electron laser exponential gain for a non-resonant electron beam

The free electron laser(FEL) gain formulas for a non-resonant case are studied, and some new rigorous analytical formulas are given explicitly. For the mono-energetic and non-resonant electron beam, the exact expression of the solution of the FEL characteristic cubic equation is obtained with a form much more simple than that in the literatures, and the gain length as the function of the detuning parameter is explicitly given. Then the gain for different detuning parameters and from low to high can be easily calculated. A simplified approximation formula is also given for the exponential gain calculation in the non-resonant case. For the case of the electron beam with an energy spread, the solution of the characteristic cubic equation is given explicitly for rectangular energy distribution and Lorentz distribution, respectively. Moreover the explicit expression also can be used for the solution of the characteristic cubic equation including the impact of the space charge. The transition from the low gain to the high gain is analyzed. The variations of the gain bandwidth and of the detuning parameter for the maximum gain are demonstrated. The applicable ranges of the small signal gain formula and the exponential gain formula are analyzed.     

Pulse collapse and blue-shifted enhanced supercontinuum in a photonic crystal fiber

The blue-shifted supercontinuum generation in a photonic crystal fiber pumped by high peak power femtosecond pulses with a wavelength located in the anomalous dispersion region is investigated experimentally and numerically.The formation of a blue-shifted enhanced supercontinuum due to the pulse collapse is demonstrated.The process of the pulse collapse is measured by using the grating-eliminated no-nonsense observation of ultrafast incident laser light e-fields technique(GRENOUILLE).Numerical simulations in spectral and temporal domains are conducted.The data from the numerical simulations are in good agreement with the experimental results.Our experimental results and numerical simulations show that pulse collapse is the determining factor in the generation of a blue-shifted supercontinuum.     

Multi-coupler side-pumped Yb-doped double-clad fiber laser

The side-coupler of angle polished method, using angle-polished multimode fiber and optical adhesive, is used to efficiently pump an Yb-doped double-clad fiber laser. The maximum coupling efficiency of 78.6% is achieved by the side-coupler for a multimode fiber with a circular core of 200μm and a double-clad fiber with a 350/400μm D-shaped inner cladding. While laser diodes (LDs) with three side-couplers are simultaneously used as pump sources, maximum output power of 1.38 W and slope efficiency of 48.9% are demonstrated in the fiber laser system.