Broadband Supercontinuum Generation in PCF, HNLF and ZBLAN Fiber with a Carbon-Nanotube-based Passively Mode-locked Erbium-doped Fiber Laser

Abstract

We demonstrate the broadband supercontinuum (SC) generation in photonic crystal fiber (PCF), highly nonlinear fiber (HNLF) and ZBLAN (ZrF4-BaF2-LaF3-AlF3-NaF) fiber with a passively mode-locked erbium-doped fiber laser (EDFL). The passively mode-locked EDFL incorporates a CNT-based saturable absorber and has achieved a pulse width of 620 fs with a pulse repetition rate of 18 MHz. The spectral broadening phenomena inside each fiber has been observed with respect to the variation in seed pulse power. The SC spectrum bandwidth of 1050 nm, 1400 nm, and 2000 nm has been achieved using PCF, HNLF, and ZBLAN fiber respectively.