Performance comparison of supercontinuum generation using various tapered fiber waist diameters with a mode-locked fiber laser

Abstract

Different waist diameters of tapered fibers were proposed and demonstrated as a nonlinear medium to compare the performance in generating supercontinuum (SC) output with a mode-locked fiber laser (MLFL) as the laser source. The MLFL source was developed using the nonlinear polarization (NPR) technique. The average output power, peak power, and pulse energy of MLFL were 3.98 mW, 0.115 kW, and 0.2 nJ, respectively. The MLFL also has a repetition rate of 19.55 MHz with a signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) of 62.92 dB. Moreover, the MLFL was amplified and launched into the tapered fiber to compare the performance of SC generation at different waist diameters. The spectral broadening generated from tapered fiber with 10 µm, 20 µm, and 30 µm waist diameters were 690 nm, 612 nm, and 550 nm, respectively. The peak power of SC output of 10 µm, 20 µm, and 30 µm tapered fibers was calculated to be 31.04 kW, 28.14 kW, and 25.72 kW, respectively. The experimental results show that the tapered fiber was an effective nonlinear device for supercontinuum generation, which will benefit various optical applications.