Rare-earth Doped Fiber Lasers Research Articles

Modeling of rare-earth-doped double-clad fiber laser based on rate equations with spatially averaged parameters

A mathematical model of a rare-earth doped double-clad fiber laser based on rate equations with spatially averaged parameters laser has been developed. Analytical expressions for the threshold absorbed pump power, slope efficiency and laser output power have been obtained for the CW regime. It has been shown that the results of output power calculations using the analytical model for CW double-clad ytterbium and neodymium doped lasers are in a good agreement with the results obtained using numerical models described in literature. A quantitative criterion for the applicability of the presented analytical model for calculating the parameters of double-clad fiber lasers has been proposed. The applicability of the proposed model to describe the transient stage of the operation of a fiber laser under continuous pumping has been demonstrated.

Fiber Lasers – Advancing the Frontier of High Power Light

During the last two and a half decades fiber lasers underwent a revolutionary transformation in their power from initially operating at Watt level to currently capable of producing multi-kW beams. This enabled a widespread use of fiber lasers in a wide range of industrial and defense applications. These revolutionary advances in power and energy are continuing, mostly along the path of coherent and incoherent combining of multiple fiber lasers, which exploits the advantage inherent in fiber technologies for monolithic integration to achieve compact and robust systems even with a large number of parallel laser channels. This is a particularly promising pathway for scaling powers and energies of ultrashort pulse lasers for driving secondary radiation sources of energetic accelerated electrons and positrons, as well as generating high energy neutrons, protons, gamma rays and high-brightness X-rays, which promise new application areas ranging from fundamental science to material science, biology, medicine, and numerous new industrial uses. This summer school lecture will cover fundamentals of rare-earth doped fiber lasers, will describe numerous innovations that enabled ultra-large core fibers constituting the foundation of high power lasers, will survey state-of-the-art performance of different types of laser systems, and will review recent progress in coherently combined fiber lasers.

Nonlinear optical properties and broadband ultrafast photonics application of 2D-zirconium tritelluride (ZrTe3)

Two-dimensional (2D) transition metal chalcogenides (TMCs) have lately attracted broad interest in advanced photonics field due to their tunable bandgap, high broadband absorption, and excellent nonlinear optical (NLO) performances. Among other TMCs, group-IV transition metal trichalcogenides (TMTs) are rarely investigated for the NLO applications. Zirconium tritelluride (ZrTe3) is a kind of group-IV TMTs that shows metallic behavior among TMTs materials. While several electrical properties of ZrTe3 have been studied recently, the research community is longing to explore NLO features of ZrTe3. Herein, by using open aperture Z-scan method, the NLO properties of ZrTe3-nanosheets are investigated. The admirable NLO characteristics of ZrTe3 are realized from the obtained highest nonlinear absorption coefficient value of −82.1 × 103 in 1 µm and −13.05 × 103 cm/GW in 1.5 µm. Moreover, broadband fiber optics ZrTe3-based saturable absorbers (SAs) are prepared for the first time by depositing 2D-ZrTe3 nanosheets on a side-polished fiber. Following integration of these ZrTe3-SAs into three distinct rare earth-doped fiber laser cavities, stable mode-locking pulses with pulse widths of 323 ps (1 µm), 751 fs (1.5 µm), and 1.2 ps (2 µm) are obtained, respectively. These findings indicate that the ZrTe3 can facilitate the exploration of 2D materials in nonlinear optics and ultrafast photonics applications.

Cascaded Raman fiber lasers with ultrahigh spectral purity.

Random distributed feedback (RDFB) cascaded Raman fiber lasers (CRFLs) are simple, wavelength agile, and enable high-power fiber lasers outside emission bandwidths of rare-earth doped fiber lasers. However, the spectral purity, defined as the percentage of total output power in the desired Stokes wavelength band, and relative intensity noise (RIN) of these systems are limited due to the intensity noise of the pump source used for Raman conversion. RIN gets amplified and transferred to Raman Stokes orders which causes incomplete Raman conversion and hence limits the spectral purity. Here, we demonstrate a low-intensity noise (<-100 dBc/Hz from 9 kHz to 10 GHz) CRFL with a record spectral purity of ∼99%, tunable over six Stokes orders, using a very low-intensity noise, narrow linewidth Yb-fiber amplifier as a pump source.

Thermo-optical numerical modal analysis of multicore fibers for high power lasers and amplifiers

Lasers for modern industrial and research applications are required to provide a high average beam power and at the same time be reliable, efficient, and compact. Rare-earth doped single-mode fiber lasers are the most promising solution. Large mode area fibers are effectively used to reduce nonlinear effects and scaling up the beam power which is now bounded by thermal effects. A new cutting-edge approach to the issue involves the use of Multi-Core Fibers (MCFs), coherently combining several lower power beams into a higher power one, and thus pushing the threshold of nonlinearities and transverse mode instabilities to higher power. The amplification process involves heat generation in the doped cores due to quantum defect, which propagates radially and creates a temperature gradient across the fiber cross-section. Even though the cores are optically uncoupled, the refractive index gradient due to thermo-optical effects could cause cross-talk and core mode coupling. In this work, we numerically analyze the performances of 9-core MCFs for high power fiber lasers by taking into account the coupling and bending effects due to the heat load generated by the quantum defect between pump and laser radiation. MCFs show very low sensitivity to heat load and bending, with effectively single-mode behaviour up to 15 μm core diameter (effective area 181 μm2) and down to 35 μm pitch.

Optimal defect position in a DFB fiber laser

Fiber lasers with compact cavity have numerous potential applications in sensing, communications, and medicine. Distributed feedback (DFB) rare-earth doped fiber lasers based on Bragg gratings with a phase shift are the most promising in this aspect. In this paper, we theoretically study such lasers and carry out a complex-frequency analysis of the DFB cavity modes. Our approach is based on the study of poles of open cavity response function and on the laser rate equations. An optimal defect position in the Bragg grating, which maximizes an output power towards one side, was found with this approach. We show that the optimal defect position depends on the pump power. At the pump level close to the lasing threshold, the defect should preferably appear in the middle of the grating to maximize the one-side output power. At higher pumping, the optimal position of the defect becomes asymmetric. We have found specific variables, which allow for determination of optimal defect position for a large variety of DFB laser configurations.

Analytical Model of a Holmium-doped Fiber Laser Including Up-conversion Transition

This paper presents theoretical investigation of a holmium-doped fiber laser. Analytical model is developed to consider the effect of up-conversion transition on the laser performance. In this model, the core pumped system is simulated at in-band pumped scheme to optimize the fiber length, pump wavelength, pump power threshold and laser wavelength. A good agreement is achieved between the simulation findings and the experiment results. The results indicate the negative effect of up-conversion transitions on the performance of holmium-doped fiber lasers via reducing the laser efficiency. Understanding the impact of this interaction is helpful to describe the reason for obtaining a lower laser efficiency than expected in experimental reports of holmium-doped fiber lasers pumped at 1.95µm wavelength region. The developed model is suggested as valid tools to simulate and optimize any rare-earth doped fiber lasers and amplifiers.

Brightness enhancement with Raman fiber lasers and amplifiers using multi-mode or multi-clad fibers

Abstract A large variety of high power, high brightness, rare earth doped fiber lasers have been demonstrated throughout recent years. Several obstacles, such as modal instabilities, heat removal and photo-darkening, have been identified as the limiters and have complicated the further power increase. Raman fiber sources have inherent advantages in regard to these challenges and therefore may offer a high power high brightness alternative. Up to over kW power Raman fiber laser and amplifier sources have recently been demonstrated with multimode graded index fiber (1002 W) as well as with multi-clad clad-pumped fiber (1200 W) in brightness enhancing configurations. In these schemes, the output Stokes-shifted-signal obtained higher brightness than the input pump source, due to the higher Raman gain associated with the lower order modes. A review of the recent results obtained with various configurations is presented, followed by discussion on the challenges and the paths towards further increase in power and brightness towards achieving near diffraction limited multi-kW Raman fiber sources.

All passive architecture for high efficiency cascaded Raman conversion

Cascaded Raman fiber lasers have offered a convenient method to obtain scalable, high-power sources at various wavelength regions inaccessible with rare-earth doped fiber lasers. A limitation previously was the reduced efficiency of these lasers. Recently, new architectures have been proposed to enhance efficiency, but this came at the cost of enhanced complexity, requiring an additional low-power, cascaded Raman laser. In this work, we overcome this with a new, all-passive architecture for high-efficiency cascaded Raman conversion. We demonstrate our architecture with a fifth-order cascaded Raman converter from 1117nm to 1480nm with output power of ~64W and efficiency of 60%.

Continuous-wave to pulse regimes for a family of passively mode-locked lasers with saturable nonlinearity

The transition dynamics from continuous-wave to pulse regimes of operation for a generic model of passively mode-locked lasers with saturable absorbers, characterized by an active medium with non-Kerr nonlinearity, are investigated analytically and numerically. The system is described by a complex Ginzburg–Landau equation with a general m:n saturable nonlinearity (i.e , where I is the field intensity and m and n are two positive numbers), coupled to a two-level gain equation. An analysis of stability of continuous waves, following the modulational instability approach, provides a global picture of the self-starting dynamics in the system. The analysis reveals two distinct routes depending on values of the couple (m, n), and on the dispersion regime: in the normal dispersion regime, when m = 2 and n is arbitrary, the self-starting requires positive values of the fast saturable absorber and nonlinearity coefficients, but negative values of these two parameters for the family with m = 0. However, when the spectral filter is negative, the laser can self-start for certain values of the input field and the nonlinearity saturation coefficient Γ. The present work provides a general map for the self-starting mechanisms of rare-earth doped figure-eight fiber lasers, as well as Kerr-lens mode-locked solid-state lasers.

Impact of cerium and lanthanum on the photo-darkening and photo-bleaching mechanisms in thulium-doped fibre

Photo-darkening prevents developing of new applications of rare-earth doped silica fibre lasers or amplifiers operating at wavelengths shorter than 1μm or at any wavelength at high power. The photo-darkening is characterized by a decrease of the laser intensity during amplification. In this article, we are interested in Tm-doped fibres. This ion offers many potential optical transitions spanning from 0.45 to 1.9μm. Several interesting transitions can be excited via up-conversion, using one pump around 1μm. However, this scheme induces a particularly fast and intense photo-darkening, enough to prevent amplification in the short wavelengths region (0.45–0.9μm). To mitigate this effect, we co-dope the fibres with cerium or lanthanum ions. By characterizing the steady state values of photo-darkening and its characteristic times, we demonstrate the beneficial role of Ce and La on the bleaching mechanisms.

Gain-switched monolithic fiber laser with ultra-wide tuning range at 2 μm.

We demonstrate a gain-switched thulium-doped fiber laser (TDFL) built in an all-fiber format producing nanosecond pulses with variable wavelength in the 2 μm waveband. The laser features tunable operation in an ultra-wide spectral region of 1765 - 2055 nm (24 THz). The nearly 300 nm tunability doubles the record tuning range of existing gain-switched fiber lasers, and to the best of our knowledge, presents the broadest tuning range that has been reported for a monolithic pulsed rare earth doped fiber laser to date. The TDFL can operate at a repetition rate of 2.5 - 100 kHz with a pulse width as short as ~200 ns. Influences of various system parameters on the laser performance are investigated in detail.

Active mode-locking via pump modulation in a Tm-doped fiber laser

We propose and experimentally realize a new class of actively mode-locking technique using pump modulation for rare-earth doped fiber lasers. A Tm-doped fiber laser at 2 μm is mode-locked using the proposed active mode-locking via pump modulation technique. Low-threshold continuous-wave mode-locking is achieved with a transform-limited pulse width of 4.4 ps, a spectral bandwidth of 0.9 nm, and a repetition rate of 12.9 MHz. Second-harmonic mode-locking is also demonstrated by simply driving the pump current at an appropriate frequency. More importantly, we believe that this technique can be applied to mode-lock other rare-earth doped fiber laser systems such as erbium- and ytterbium-doped fiber lasers.

Theoretical and numerical treatment of modal instability in high-power core and cladding-pumped Raman fiber amplifiers.

Raman fiber lasers have been proposed as potential candidates for scaling beyond the power limitations imposed on near diffraction-limited rare-earth doped fiber lasers. One limitation is the modal instability (MI) and we explore the physics of this phenomenon in Raman fiber amplifiers (RFAs). By utilizing the conservation of number of photons and conservation of energy in the absence of loss, the 3 × 3 governing system of nonlinear equations describing the pump and the signal modal content are decoupled and solved analytically for cladding-pumped RFAs. By comparing the extracted signal at MI threshold for the same step index-fiber, it is found that the MI threshold is independent of the length of the amplifier or whether the amplifier is co-pumped or counter-pumped; dictated by the integrated heat load along the length of fiber. We extend our treatment to gain-tailored RFAs and show that this approach is of limited utility in suppressing MI. Finally, we formulate the physics of MI in core-pumped RFAs where both pump and signal interferences participate in writing the time-dependent index of refraction grating.

Versatile and widely tunable mid-infrared erbium doped ZBLAN fiber laser.

We report on a long wavelength emitting rare earth doped fiber laser with the emission centered at 3.5 μm and tunable across 450 nm. The longest wavelength emission was 3.78 μm which is the longest emission from a fiber laser operating at room temperature. In a simple optical arrangement employing dielectric mirrors for feedback, the laser was capable of emitting 1.45 W of near diffraction limited output power at 3.47 μm. These emission characteristics complement the emissions from quantum cascade lasers and demonstrate how all infrared dual wavelength pumping can be used to access high lying rare earth ion transitions that have previously relied on visible wavelength pumping.

Reflectivity of transient Bragg reflection gratings in fiber laser with laser-wavelength self-sweeping.

We present a method for the estimation of the reflection spectra of transient gratings in rare-earth doped fiber lasers having a self-sweeping of laser wavelength. We show that high reflectivities of several tens of percent can be achieved. An example of this is demonstrated through the use of an experimental Yb-doped Fabry-Perot fiber laser. The gratings' spectra are highly asymmetric due to the apodization of the refractive index modulation. The importance of the self-sweeping regime for triggering self-Q-switched laser instabilities is discussed.

Invited paper: Short pulse generation in mid-IR fiber lasers

Mode-locked fiber lasers emitting short pulses of light at wavelengths of 2μm and longer are reviewed. Rare-earth doped silica and fluoride fiber lasers operating in the mode-locked regime in the mid-IR (2–5μm) have attracted attention due to their usefulness to spectroscopy, nonlinear optics, laser surgery, remote sensing and ranging to name a few. While silica fiber lasers are fundamentally limited to emission wavelengths below 2.2μm, fluoride fiber lasers can reach to nearly 4μm. The relative infancy of fluoride fibers as compared to silica fibers means the field has work to do to translate the mode-locking techniques to systems beyond 2μm. However, with the recent demonstration of a stable, mode-locked 3μm fiber laser, the possibility of achieving high performance 3μm class mode-locked fiber lasers looks promising.

Power scaling of high-efficiency 15 μm cascaded Raman fiber lasers

High power fiber lasers operating at the 1.5micron wavelength region have attractive features like eye-safety and atmospheric transparency, and cascaded Raman fiber lasers offer a convenient method to obtain high power sources at these wavelengths. A limitation to power scaling however has been the lower conversion efficiency of these lasers. We recently introduced a high efficiency architecture for high power cascaded Raman fiber lasers applicable for 1.5micron fiber lasers. Here we demonstrate further power scaling using this new architecture. Using numerical simulations we identify the ideal operating conditions for the new architecture. We demonstrate a high efficiency 1480nm cascaded Raman fiber laser with an output power of 301 W, comparable to record power levels achieved with rare-earth doped fiber lasers in the 1.5 micron wavelength region.

Design and refinement of rare earth doped multicore fiber lasers

A novel multicore ytterbium doped fiber laser is designed, with the target of maximizing both the effective mode area and the beam quality, by means of a complete home-made computer code. It can be employed to construct high power and Quasi-Gaussian beam lasers. The novel laser configuration exploits a single mode multicore fiber and does not need Talbot cavity or other in-phase mode selection mechanisms. This is an innovative solution, because to the best of our knowledge, for the first time, we have designed a truly single-mode multicore fiber laser. For comparison we have optimized two other laser configurations which are well known in literature, both employing a multimode multicore fiber and a Talbot cavity as a feedback for the in-phase supermode selection. All three multicore fibers, constituted by the same glass, are doped with the same ytterbium ion concentration and pumped with the same input power. Multimodal fiber lasers exhibit lower beam quality, i.e. a higher beam quality factor M2, with respect to the single mode one, even if suitable Talbot cavities are designed, but they are very competitive when a more compact laser cavity is required for the same output power. The novel single mode nineteen core laser exhibits a simulated effective mode area Aeff=703μm2 and a beam quality factor M2=1.05, showing better characteristics than the other two lasers.

Active Q-switching in an erbium-doped fiber laser using an ultrafast silicon-based variable optical attenuator

Presented herein is the use of an ultrafast Si-based variable optical attenuator (VOA) as a Q-switch for rare earth-doped fiber lasers. The ultrafast VOA is based on a forward-biased p-i-n diode integrated with a ridge waveguide, which was originally designed and optimized for WDM channel power equalization in optical communication systems. By incorporating a Si-based VOA with a transient time of ~410 ns into an erbium-doped fiber-based Fabry-Perot cavity it has been shown that stable Q-switched pulses possessing a temporal width of less than ~86 ns can be readily obtained at a repetition rate of up to ~1 MHz. The laser's peak power of ~38 W is shown to be obtainable at 20 kHz with a slope efficiency of ~21%.