Abstract
Yb:YCOB is a very attractive material for femtosecond pulse generation given its broad emission bandwidth. We demonstrate continuous-wave power scaling in the thin disk geometry to the 100-W level with a 40% optical-to-optical efficiency in multi-mode operation. Furthermore, we present initial modelocking results in the thin disk geometry, achieving pulse durations as short as 270 fs. The modelocked average power is, however, limited to less than 5 W because of transverse mode degradation. This is caused by anisotropic thermal aberrations in the 15% Yb-doped thin disks which were 300 to 400 µm thick. This result confirms the potential of Yb:YCOB to generate short femtosecond pulses in the thin disk geometry but also makes clear that significantly thinner disks are required to overcome the thermal limitations for high power operation.
Highlights
The power scalable concept of the thin disk laser [1] has led to kilowatt continuous-wave power levels with high beam quality and high efficiencies [2] directly out of an oscillator
We present initial modelocking results in the thin disk geometry, achieving pulse durations as short as 270 fs
The modelocked average power is, limited to less than 5 W because of transverse mode degradation. This is caused by anisotropic thermal aberrations in the 15% Yb-doped thin disks which were 300 to 400 μm thick. This result confirms the potential of Yb:YCOB to generate short femtosecond pulses in the thin disk geometry and makes clear that significantly thinner disks are required to overcome the thermal limitations for high power operation
Summary
The power scalable concept of the thin disk laser [1] has led to kilowatt continuous-wave (cw) power levels with high beam quality and high efficiencies [2] directly out of an oscillator. SESAM modelocking of this material has supported the shortest pulses from any modelocked Yb-doped oscillator so far: 46 fs at 46 mW of average output power [14]. This was further reduced to 42 fs with external compression, demonstrating the extremely broad gain bandwidth of Yb:YCOB. We used relatively thick Yb:YCOB disks in the range of 300-400 μm because the doping concentration of the available crystals was limited to 15at.% This limited the average output power in the fundamental mode to less than 10 W due to strong anisotropic thermal effects, but still allowed for power scaling to more than 100 W in multi-mode operation
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