In this paper we report on successful supercontinuum generation extending from the near to the mid-infrared region in the range 700-2500 nm in a micro-structured fiber made of lead-bismuth-galate glass and pumped in the femtosecond regime with a wavelength of 1540 nm. The flatness of 5 dB is observed in most of the registered spectrum 1000 -2500 nm. The improved spectral and thermo-physical properties of this custom made lead-bismuth-galate glass against tellurite and commercially available heavy oxide SF-57 glasses are presented.

The application of a commercially available spatial light modulator (SLM) to control the spatial intensity distribution of a nanosecond pulsed laser for micromachining is described for the first time. Heat sinking is introduced to increase the average power handling capabilities of the SLM beyond recommended limits by the manufacturer. Complex intensity patterns are generated, using the Inverse Fourier Transform Algorithm, and example laser machining is demonstrated. The SLM enables both complex beam shaping and also beam steering.

We present a novel fabrication technology for nano-structured graded index micro-optical components, based on the stack-and-draw method used for photonic crystal fibres. These discrete structures can be described with an effective refractive index distribution. Furthermore we present spherical nano-structured microlenses with a flat facet fabricated with this method and designed using an algorithm based on the Maxwell-Garnett mixing formula. Finally we show theoretical verification by using FDTD simulations for a nano-structured lens as well as experimental data obtained in the microwave regime.

We report on octave-spanning supercontinuum generation under pumping with 1360 nm, 120 fs pulses, in an all-solid, all-normal dispersion photonic crystal fiber. The fiber was drawn from thermally matched oxide soft glasses with a hexagonal lattice 35 µm in diameter, 2.5 µm solid core and pitch of Λ/d = 0.9. The fiber was designed for normal dispersion broadly flattened in the 1200–2800 nm range. Experimentally recorded supercontinuum spectrum covered a 900–1900 nm bandwidth and was reconstructed with good agreement using numerical modeling. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first report of an experimentally demonstrated octave-spanning supercontinuum bandwidth, reaching as far as 1900 nm in the all-normal dispersion regime.

Single-photon avalanche diode (SPAD) detector arrays generally suffer from having a low fill-factor, in which the photo-sensitive area of each pixel is small compared to the overall area of the pixel. This paper describes the integration of different configurations of high efficiency diffractive optical microlens arrays onto a 32 × 32 SPAD array, fabricated using a 0.35 µm CMOS technology process. The characterization of SPAD arrays with integrated microlens arrays is reported over the spectral range of 500-900 nm, and a range of f-numbers from f/2 to f/22. We report an average concentration factor of 15 measured for the entire SPAD array with integrated microlens array. The integrated SPAD and microlens array demonstrated a very high uniformity in overall efficiency.