Bright-dark-bright soliton generation in erbium-doped fiber laser based on Pb3Sn4FeSb2S14 saturable absorber

Abstract

Pb3Sn4FeSb2S14, a novel two-dimensional layered material, exhibits competitive properties, including a hexagonal crystal structure and excellent air stability. It has a relatively low bandgap value of 0.65 eV and is similar to the structure of franckeite, showing alternating segregation of Sn-rich and Pb-rich layers. In this paper, an erbium-doped fiber laser was successfully fabricated using the multi-element compound Pb3Sn4FeSb2S14 as a saturable absorber. In the experiment, the bright-dark-bright pulsed laser output was observed when the pump power was between 200 mW and 550 mW. The two central wavelengths were 1559.10 and 1559.78 nm. The fundamental repetition frequency of the pulse was 1.64 MHz and the signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) was about 48 dB. The results demonstrate that Pb3Sn4FeSb2S14 is an effective modulator for bright-dark-bright soliton fiber lasers due to its good nonlinear saturation absorption characteristics.