Effect of the seed power spectral density on spectral broadening in kW-level narrow-linewidth fiber amplifiers

Abstract

Narrow-linewidth high-power fiber amplifiers are demanded in the spectral beam combining technique for power scaling. This article has experimentally studied the seed power spectral density (PSD) effect on the spectral broadening in all-fiber high-power narrow-linewidth fiber amplifier based on fiber Bragg grating (FBG) structure. It was found that the spectral bandwidth of the amplifier output reduces by increasing the PSD of the seed source. During the experiments, a ytterbium-doped fiber (YDF) amplifier was injected by three seed sources with the PSDs of 1.27 W/pm, 1.5 W/pm and 1.8 W/pm to scale up the seed power. After amplification, the resultant 3-dB spectral bandwidth of the amplifier was measured to be 88 pm, 61 pm, and 41 pm, respectively, at kW-level power. Meanwhile, we developed a 990 W fiber amplifier with a 3-dB spectral bandwidth of 41 pm; the narrowest spectrum achieved using a simple FBG-based master oscillator power amplifier configuration at this power level.