Graphene slurry based passive Q-switcher in erbium doped fiber laser

Siti Nur Fatin Zuikafly,Fauzan Ahmad,Nor Farhah Razak,Sulaiman Wadi Harun,Rizuan Mohd Rosnan

doi:10.11591/eei.v8i4.1609

Abstract

In this work, a Graphene slurry based passive Q-switcher fabricated from Graphene-Polylactic acid (PLA) filament which is used for 3D printing. To produce the Graphene slurry, the diameter of the filament was reduced and Tetrahydrofuran (THF) was used to dissolve the PLA. The Graphene-THF suspension was drop cast to the end of a fiber ferrule and the THF then evaporated to develop Graphene slurry based SA which is integrated in fiber laser cavity. At threshold input pump power of 30.45 mW, a Q-switched Erbium-doped fiber laser (EDFL) can be observed with the wavelength centered at 1531.01 nm and this remained stable up to a pump power of 179.5 mW. As the pump power was increased gradually, an increase in the repetition rates was recorded from 42 kHz to 125 kHz, while the pulse width was reduced to 2.58 μs from 6.74 μs. The Q-switched laser yielded a maximum pulse energy and peak power of 11.68 nJ and 4.16 mW, respectively. The proposed Graphene slurry based saturable absorber also produced a signal-to-noise ratio of 44 dB indicating a stable Q-switched pulsed laser.

Highlights

With the rapid growth of industrial nations in todays’ world, technological advantages of ultrafast fiber lasers seemed attractive as an option in comprehensive industrials, and in scientific applications
We introduce a new approach in preparing Graphene based saturable absorber for pulsed fiber laser generation by using conductive Graphene-Polylactic acid (PLA) filament as the starting material to develop a Graphene slurry based passive Q-switcher
The operating wavelength was shifted from longer wavelength at 1565.77 nm without Graphene slurry based saturable absorber (SA) with output power of –24.4 dBm to 1531.27 nm at -40.02 dBm, respectively when the Graphene slurry based SA integrated in the laser cavity

Summary

Introduction

With the rapid growth of industrial nations in todays’ world, technological advantages of ultrafast fiber lasers seemed attractive as an option in comprehensive industrials, and in scientific applications Since it is first reported in 2009 [1], Graphene has been put to practical and effective use of as saturable absorber in generating fiber lasers, may it be in Q-switching or mode-locking regime [2,3,4,5]. Q-switching operation in pulsed laser generation using Graphene can be realized by several synthesization approaches including liquid phase exfoliation (LPE), chemical vapour deposition (CVD), reduced Graphene Oxide (rGO), micro-mechanical cleavage [7] and by electrochemical exfoliation technique [8].

Methods

Results

Conclusion