Study of Lanthanum Aluminum Silicate Glasses for Passive and Active Optical Fibers

Abstract

We are reporting onSiO2‐Al2O3‐La2O3glasses—with and withoutYb2O3—suitable for nonlinear and fiber laser applications. We will also be presenting successful supercontinuum generation and fiber laser operation around 1060 nm in step‐index fibers. We optimized the glass compositions in terms of thermal and optical requirements for both a highLa2O3andYb2O3concentration and good compatibility with a silica cladding. We also produced bulk samples, unstructured fibers, and structured fibers with aSiO2‐Al2O3‐La2O3core and silica cladding for this purpose.