Linear-cavity Fiber Laser Research Articles

Narrow bandwidth mode-locked fiber laser with the GIMF-based saturable absorber

We have demonstrated the realization of the nearly transform-limited conventional solitons (CSs) with narrow spectral bandwidth in an Er-doped linear-cavity fiber laser, which is mode-locked by the graded index multimode fiber (GIMF)-based saturable absorber (SA). To our knowledge, this is the first report of the GIMF-based SA in the narrow bandwidth soliton generation. Simultaneously, the wavelength tunability of 0.48 nm and controllable Kelly sidebands for the narrow bandwidth solitons can be realized by the polarization controller (PC). Thereby, the minimum spectral bandwidth of the CSs reaches to be 0.1 nm, accompanied by the pulse duration of 20.8 ps and pulse energy of 1.07 nJ. Our work provides a compact and low-cost alternative for the narrow bandwidth solitons and offers a promising platform in the fields such as spectroscopy, quantum optics and other fields.

Linear Fiber Laser Configurations for Optical Concentration Sensing in Liquid Solutions

In this study, different configurations based on linear fiber lasers were proposed and experimentally demonstrated to measure the concentration of liquid solutions. Samples of paracetamol liquid solutions with different concentrations, in the range from 52.61 to 201.33 g/kg, were used as a case-study. The optical gain was provided by a commercial bidirectional Erbium-Doped Fiber Amplifier (EDFA) and the linear cavity was obtained using two commercial Fiber Bragg Gratings (FBGs). The main difference of each configuration was the coupling ratio of the optical coupler used to extract the system signal. The sensing head corresponded to a Single-Mode Fiber (SMF) tip that worked as an intensity sensor. The results reveal that, despite the optical coupler used (50:50, 60:40, 70:30 or 80:20), all the configurations reached the laser condition, however, the concentration sensing was only possible using a laser drive current near to the threshold value. The configurations using a 70:30 and an 80:20 optical coupler allowed paracetamol concentration measurements with a higher sensitivity of (−3.00 ± 0.24) pW/(g/kg) to be performed. In terms of resolution, the highest value obtained was 1.75 g/kg, when it was extracted at 20% of the output power to the linear cavity fiber laser configuration.

Optimization of Dual-Wavelength linear cavity Erbium-Doped fiber laser based on pairs of fiber Bragg gratings

There are few reports in the field of linear cavity dual-wavelength fiber lasers about the laser output characteristics when 3-dB fiber loop mirror (FLM) and Fiber Bragg grating (FBG) are used as full reflective mirrors, respectively. Additionally, there is scarce research on further tuning of the FBG parameters (reflectivity and center wavelength interval) to study dual-wavelength fiber lasers. In this paper, we compare the performances of dual-wavelength lasing outputs between the 3-dB FLM-FBG cavity and the FBG-only cavity in a linear-cavity erbium-doped fiber laser (EDFL) based on the polarization hole burning effect. The results show that the optical signal-to-noise ratios (OSNRs) of the dual-wavelength lasing outputs with the FBG-only cavity are approximately 4 ∼ 5 dB higher than those with the 3-dB FLM-FBG cavity. Furthermore, the lasing output performances based on the FBG-only cavity are compared when the reflectivities of the output-mirror FBGs are the same or different. It is observed that the dual-wavelength laser with the same output reflectivity leads to higher OSNR, slope efficiency, and stability. Moreover, by varying the center wavelength interval of pairs of FBGs in the FBG-only cavity to values of 4 nm, 8 nm, and 12 nm respectively. It is shown that wider intervals result in higher OSNRs but lower laser slope efficiency. Finally, we demonstrate a dual- wavelength linear cavity EDFL operating at room temperature with two lasing wavelengths of 1550 nm and 1562 nm. The laser results in OSNRs around 50.62 dB and 50.93 dB; center wavelength variations of less than 0.030 nm and 0.035 nm; output power fluctuations of less than 0.061 mW and 0.059 mW, respectively.

Tunable ultra-narrow linewidth linear-cavity fiber lasers assisted by distributed external feedback

We proposed and demonstrated a widely tunable and ultra-narrow linewidth fiber laser scheme by exploiting an original Fabry-Perot laser main cavity and a distributed external feedback structure. This was feasible with the aid of a feedback signal with distributed characteristics which is injected into the main cavity to induce an intense mode competition effect. Eventually, a single frequency fiber laser with a side mode suppression ratio of 69 dB, an output linewidth of 570 Hz, a white frequency noise of 110 Hz2/Hz at the frequency offset that is beyond 2 × 105 Hz, and a relative intensity noise less than −140 dB/Hz is successfully obtained under normal conditions. Also, the high spectral purity performance of the laser can be maintained under different pump powers for each wavelength channel. This work presents a promising method to obtain tunable ultra-narrow linewidth lasers.

Machine-learning iterative optimization for all polarization-maintaining linear cavity Er:fiber laser.

All polarization-maintaining (PM) linear cavity mode-locked fiber lasers are promising ultrafast laser sources due to their compactness and environmental robustness. Here, we demonstrate a linear cavity fiber laser with all-PM configuration experimentally and investigate the mode-locking formation of the laser using a machine-learning iterative optimization method based on the Gaussian process. The optimization algorithm can converge rapidly after only 30 runs. Using the optimized parameters, we simulate the generation of mode-locked pulses from noise. The output spectrum and pulse energy are highly consistent with the experiment. Furthermore, we describe the intracavity dynamic evolution under group velocity mismatch. We then show that the pulse trapping induced by cross-phase modulation leads to the overcompensated time synchronization between the orthogonally polarized components.

Optimization and demonstration of a bidirectional output linear-cavity fiber laser with a record high power of 2 × 4 kW

The bidirectional output fiber laser can achieve two laser outputs from a single resonant cavity, which can reduce the volume and cost of high-power fiber laser systems and has good application prospects in the industry. In this work, we demonstrated a bidirectional output fiber laser oscillator structure, and a total output power of 8 kW at the 2 ports × 4 kW level was achieved experimentally for the first time. In order to suppress stimulated Raman scattering (SRS) and transverse mode instability (TMI), the double cladding ytterbium-doped fiber with a core/cladding diameter of 30/400 µm, a pair of matched output coupler fiber Bragg gratings (OCFBG) with a 3 dB bandwidth of 2 nm, and the pump source with wavelength-stabilized 981 nm laser diodes (LDs) were employed. The effect of the coiling method and diameter of the active fiber on the optical-to-optical (O-O) efficiency and TMI threshold were studied intensively. The comparison of laser performance with a unidirectional output oscillator was further exploited, and results indicated that the bidirectional output fiber laser oscillator possessed a higher O-O efficiency and TMI threshold. By optimizing the fiber coiling diameter and coiling method, we finally achieved a total laser output power of 8169 W (3769 W at end A and 4400 W at end B), with an efficiency of 74.6% and beam quality of M2A ∼ 2.13, M2B ∼ 2.36, while the total output power achieved by unidirectional output structure was only 5805 W with signs of TMI. To the best of our knowledge, it is the highest output power of the bidirectional output fiber laser.

Optical fiber temperature sensor based on beat frequency and Vernier effect of fiber ring resonator composite cavity

A fiber temperature sensing scheme based on beat frequency and Vernier effect of fiber ring resonator (FRR) with composite cavity is proposed and experimentally demonstrated. The optical FRR as a sensor is put into the linear cavity fiber laser, and Vernier effect is generated when the resonance spectrum of the optical FRR and the longitudinal mode of the laser are superimposed. The beat frequency envelope spectrum corresponding to the longitudinal mode Vernier spectrum is used to realize fiber ring sensing in electrical domain, and the sensing information is obtained by tracing the envelope of beat frequency signal, which has the advantages of stable system, simple structure, low cost and high sensitivity.

Intracavity filtering effect in a dual-output linear-cavity all-PM fiber laser mode-locked byNPE.

We have demonstrated a stable and low-noise all-polarization-maintaining (PM) ultrafast erbium-doped fiber laser mode-locked via nonlinear polarization evolution (NPE) in a linear cavity with dual outputs. A detailed design strategy is presented. The all-PM configuration enhances the capability of resistance to environmental fluctuations. Self-starting mode-locking is realized by using a non-reciprocal phase shifter. The dual-output structure offers the intracavity filtering effect, where the reflective port serves as a bandpass spectral filter, significantly improving the transmissive-port optical properties. The laser directly generates ultrashort pulses with a pulse duration of 129fs operating at a fundamental repetition rate of 105.8MHz. The integrated root-mean-square (RMS) relative intensity noise from 10Hz to 10MHz is ∼0.008%, and the integrated RMS timing jitter from 5kHz to 10MHz is ∼36f s. Long-term stability is confirmed in 25h with a RMS power fluctuation of ∼0.10%. Our high-performance fiber laser is a prospective candidate for low-noise applications.

All-Polarization-Maintaining Linear Cavity Fiber Lasers Mode-Locked by Nonlinear Polarization Evolution in Stretched Pulse Regime

Nonlinear polarization evolution (NPE) is among the most advanced techniques for obtaining ultrashort pulses with excellent optical performance. However, it is challenging to design environmentally stable NPE fiber oscillators using only polarization-maintaining (PM) fibers. Here, we use the same PM fiber and non-reciprocal phase shifter to design two different devices, which are capable of acting as effective NPE saturable absorbers (SAs) in two all-PM linear cavity fiber lasers. These two laser setups differ in the position of the non-reciprocal phase shifter, the presence of which is crucial for the proposed fiber lasers to reduce their mode-locking thresholds and achieve high repetition rates above 100 MHz. The mode-locking principle and pulse evolution in the laser cavity are investigated theoretically. The first all-PM fiber oscillator emits sub-200 fs stretched pulses with low peak powers. The second oscillator, with a simpler architecture, directly delivers stretched pulses with high peak powers, the spectral bandwidth greater than 30 nm, and the pulse duration less than 90 fs. To the best of our knowledge, 79 fs achieved in this design is the shortest pulse duration provided by PM fiber lasers using NPE mode-lockers.

Paracetamol concentration-sensing scheme based on a linear cavity fiber laser configuration

A paracetamol concentration-sensing scheme based on a linear cavity fiber laser configuration is demonstrated experimentally. The laser cavity has a fiber sensor at one end, that allows refractive index measurements. The refractometer consists of a cleaved fiber tip combined with an FBG functioning as a reflecting mirror. The combination of a fiber loop mirror at the other end allows to reflect all the light from the FBG and refractometer, forming a linear cavity. By measuring the intensity variation of the Fresnel reflection at the fiber-to-liquid interface, the measured concentration is linear and have a concentration sensitivity of -8.74±0.34×10-5µW/(g/kg), over a range of 52.61 to 219.25 g/kg, and with a resolution of 2.77 g/kg.The results obtained present high stability and prove the potential of the fiber laser system to performed real-time measurements of concentration, in a non-invasive way.

Tunable and switchable dual-wavelength SLM narrow-linewidth fiber laser with cascaded passive double-ring cavity narrowband filters

In this article, we have proposed and demonstrated a tunable, switchable dual-wavelength linear cavity fiber laser, which has a passive dual ring cavity structures (DRCs) and polarization-maintaining fiber Bragg grating (PM-FBG), and can be used for the operation of single-longitudinal mode(SLM), narrow-linewidth, and orthogonal single polarization. The passive DRCs, consisted of four 2 × 2 optical couplers (OCs), work as the narrow-band filter and mirror. The tunable and switchable wavelength of the fiber laser is realized by stretching PM-FBG and adjusting the polarization controller (PC). The optical signal-to-noise ratio (OSNR) at the dual-wavelength operating state can be more than 45 dB in the tunable range. While the OSNR of fiber laser at the each-wavelength operating state can reach 50 dB with the maximum wavelength and power fluctuation of 0.01 nm and 1.2 dB, during the monitoring time of 40 min. In addition, the measured laser linewidths are 375 Hz and 420 Hz, respectively. Meanwhile, the states of polarization are orthogonal single polarization, and the degree of polarization (DOP) is close to 100 %.

Fiber Bragg grating-based linear-cavity fiber laser.

A fiber Bragg grating-based linear-cavity fiber laser is proposed and demonstrated experimentally. A single-mode fiber Bragg grating is used as a wavelength selector in the fundamental mode, and four few-mode fiber Bragg gratings are used to reflect LP01 mode, LP11 mode, LP21 mode and LP02 mode at the same wavelength. Different modes can be reflected at the same wavelength between a single-mode fiber Bragg grating and four few-mode fiber Bragg gratings to form four sub-linear-cavities. This fiber laser, which enables simultaneous lasing of LP01 mode, LP11 mode, LP21 mode and LP02 mode at the same wavelength, plays an important role in the field of mode-division multiplexing fiber-optic communications.

Mode-locked Yb-doped fiber laser with graded-index multimode fiber as saturable absorber with gain management

We experimentally demonstrate a novel, linear-cavity mode-locked Yb-doped fiber laser based on the graded-index multimode fiber (GIMF) as saturable absorber, and propose the use of varying gain levels by doubling gain fiber length to mitigate the technical difficulty of multimode fiber as a saturable absorber in the length accuracy requirements. It provides a more flexible solution to achieve a highly stable mode-locked fiber laser based on GIMF. By analogy to dispersion management, we refer to this scheme as gain management. By adopting the two mechanisms of flexible GIMF length and gain management simultaneously, a stable mode-locked pulse train with the repetition rate of 10.96 MHz and pulse duration of ∼83.4 ps at 1064.07 nm was generated. Stable pulse bunches with pulse numbers up to 12 in a single bunch were obtained when increasing the pump power. The proposed gain management method opens a promising way for practical highly stable mode-locked technology based on nonlinear multimode interference mechanism.

C and L band fiber lasers enhanced by ultrafast laser inscribed artificial backscatter reflectors

This letter presents an experimental comparison between two linear-cavity erbium-doped fiber lasers (EDFL) assisted by two different artificial backscatter fiber-based reflectors. Both reflectors were inscribed by femtosecond laser direct writing, one of them within a single-mode fiber (SMF) and the other one within a multi-mode fiber (MMF). Although the erbium-doped fiber amplifier (EDFA) used in both structures was the same and both reflectors were manufactured under the same parameters, the reflection spectrum of each was clearly different due to their different physical properties. The first linear-cavity EDFL, consisting of an SMF-based reflector with 9µm core and 125µm cladding, resulted in a single laser emission line located in the C-band and centered at 1564.4 nm, exhibiting an optical signal-to-noise ratio (OSNR) of 52dB when pumped at 100mW. On the other hand, a single laser emission line with a similar OSNR but in L-band (centered at 1574.5nm) was obtained when using an MMF-based reflector with 50µm core and 125µm cladding.

Wavelength-tunable mode-locked linear-cavity Yb-doped fiber laser based on GIMF

A wavelength-tunable passive mode-locked linear-cavity Yb-doped fiber (YDF) laser has been demonstrated. The mode-locked operation was realized by using a semiconductor saturation absorption mirror as a cavity end-reflector. The laser wavelength was tuned by moving the horizontally adjustable platforms to bend a segment of the graded-index multimode fibers (GIMFs) in the cavity. The central wavelength of the output pulse is continuously adjustable in our experiment and the tunable range is from 1031.99 to 1039.32 nm. The output pulses have a 3 dB bandwidth of 1.77 nm and the fundamental repetition rate of 15.33 MHz. The average output power is 15.18 mW, the corresponding pulse energy is 0.99 nJ. The experimental results show that GIMF can be used as an efficient and simple way to tune the wavelength output in the mode-locked linear-cavity YDF laser.

2 × 2 kW near-single-mode bidirectional high-power output from a single-cavity monolithic fiber laser.

Traditional monolithic fiber lasers can only achieve unidirectional high-power laser output. In this Letter, a novel high-power linear cavity fiber laser that can achieve bidirectional high-power output is proposed and demonstrated. In an ordinary laser resonant cavity, we replace the high-reflectivity fiber Bragg grating with a low-reflectivity fiber Bragg grating to realize bidirectional laser output. In our experiment, the laser cavity was composed of two fiber Bragg gratings with a reflectivity of about 10%. The pump power provided by the 976 nm laser diodes was injected into a double-clad Yb-doped fiber with core/cladding diameters of 20/400 µm. At the maximum pump power, the bidirectional output powers were 2025 W and 1948 W, respectively, and the output laser beam quality (M2 factor) at both ends was about 1.5. For the first time, to the best of our knowledge, the feasibility of a bidirectional output fiber laser that can achieve double high (2-kW-level) power was verified. Compared with a traditional unidirectional output laser, this type of bidirectional output laser can achieve a double high-power laser by employing a laser resonant cavity. Thus, the average cost and structure size can be further reduced in mass production.

Generation of unconventional burst-pulse bundle in ytterbium-doped double-clad fiber laser based on self-mode-locked and double passively Q-switched technologies

We experimentally demonstrate the unconventional burst-pulse bundle generation in a linear-cavity ytterbium-doped double-clad fiber laser based on self-mode-locked and double passively-Q-switched technologies. When the pump power is 4421.0 mW, we obtained the burst pulse bundle with proportional pulse qualities. The full width at half maximum (FWHM) of the burst pulse is 2.2 μs, the time interval between the adjacent burst pulse is 2.4 μs and the energy of a single burst pulse is 0.62 μJ. In addition, the maximum burst-pulse energy is 0.85 μJ at the pump power of 4574.0 mW, the minimum FWHM and time interval are 1.7 and 1.4 μs at the pump power of 5387.0 mW. The formation mechanism of the unconventional burst pulse bundle is also discussed in detail.

Rotation angle measurement method based on self-mixing interference of a fiber laser.

A rotation angle measurement method based on self-mixing interference (SMI) of a fiber laser is proposed. The rotation angle can be calculated indirectly by the displacement measured by SMI. In the experiment, a linear cavity fiber laser with simple structure and high flexibility is used as the optical source for measuring the deflection angle. To improve the measurement accuracy, the SMI signal is filtered by the variational mode decomposition (VMD) algorithm. The filtered SMI signal is normalized by Hilbert transform. The even-power algorithm is used to subdivide the interference fringes, so as to improve the measurement resolution. The experimental result shows that the measurement error of angular shift is less than 1% in the range of 10°.

Machine learning method for calculating mode-locking performance of linear cavity fiber lasers

As a commonly used pulse light source, fiber mode-locked lasers are widely used in communication, frequency comb, nonlinear optics and other fields. Although people can accurately predict and analyze the performance of mode-locked pulse with given parameters of fiber laser by existing theories and calculation methods, it is difficult to analyze the mode-locked performance of fiber laser with multi-parameter changes by traditional methods. In this paper, we use machine learning technology to put forward a new view on this problem. Firstly, we use an artificial neural network (ANN) to judge whether a small noise pulse can evolve into a stable mode-locked state in the linear cavity fiber laser. Then, the time domain function of sample pulse is expanded by Fourier series. We use the Fourier coefficients as the network output and train another ANN that can predict the pulse shape quickly and accurately. Finally, we demonstrate how to use the genetic algorithm and the trained network to compute the parameters of the fiber laser when the given pulse width is known. The authors believe that the theoretical ideas and computational models presented in this work have great potential in the dynamics research and fabrication of fiber lasers.

High signal-to-noise ratio fiber laser at 1596 nm based on a Bi/Er/La co-doped silica fiber

We fabricate a high-performance Bi/Er/La co-doped silica fiber with a fluorescence intensity of -33.8 dBm and a gain coefficient of 1.9 dB/m. With the utilization of the fiber as a gain medium, a linear-cavity fiber laser has been constructed, which exhibits a signal-to-noise ratio of 74.9 dB at 1596 nm. It has been demonstrated that the fiber laser has a maximum output power of 107.4 mW, a slope efficiency of up to 17.0%, and a linewidth of less than 0.02 nm. Moreover, an all-fiber single-stage optical amplifier is built up for laser amplification, by which the amplified laser power is up to 410.0 mW with pump efficiency of 33.8%. The results indicate that the laser is capable of high signal-to-noise ratio and narrow linewidth, with potential applications for optical fiber sensing, biomedicine, precision measurement, and the pump source of the mid-infrared fiber lasers.