High-energy, tunable, mid-infrared, picosecond optical parametric generation in CdSiP 2

Abstract

ABSTRACT We report a tunable, high-energy, single-pass, optical parametric generator (OPG) based on the new nonlinear material, cadmium silicon phosphide, CdSiP 2 . The OPG is pumped by a laboratory designed cavity-dumped passively mode-locked, diode-pumped, Nd:YAG oscillator, providing 25 µJ pulses in 20 ps at 5 Hz. The pump energy is further boosted by a flashlamp-pumped Nd:YAG amplifier to 2.5 mJ. The OPG is temperature tunable over 1263–1286 nm (23 nm) in the signal and 6153–6731 nm (578 nm) in the idler, corresponding to a total tuning range of 601 nm. Using the single-pass OPG configuration, we have generated signal energy as high as 636 µJ at 1283 nm, together with an idler energy of 33 µJ at 6234 nm, for 2.1 mJ of input pump energy. The signal pulses generated from the OPG have a Gaussian pulse duration of 24 ps and an FWHM spectral bandwidth of 10.4 nm at central wavelength of 1276 nm. The corresponding idler spectrum has an FWHM bandwidth of 140 nm centered at 6404 nm. Keywords: Optical parametric generation, mid-infrared, Cadmium silicon phosphide, picosecond pulses.