Thin-disk lasers (TDLs) have made spectacular progress in the last decades both in continuous-wave and ultrafast operation. Nowadays, single thin-disk oscillators with > 16 kW of continuous-wave (CW)-power have been demonstrated and ultrafast amplifiers have largely surpassed the kilowatt milestone with pulse energies in the multi-100 mJ range. This amazing development has been demonstrated in the 1-µm wavelength range, using Yb-doped materials and supported by industrially available components. Motivated by both strong scientific and industrial applications, interest in expanding this performance to longer wavelength regions continues to increase. In particular, TDLs emitting directly in the short-wave mid-infrared (SW-MIR) region (2-3 µm) are especially sought after, and although many early studies have been reported, most remained in the proof-of-principle stage and the potential for multi-100-W operation remained undemonstrated. Here, we report on our recent results of a single fundamental-mode CW Ho:YAG thin-disk oscillator with >100 W of power, surpassing previous single-mode TDLs by a factor of >4, and marking a first milestone in the development of high-power SW-MIR TDLs. In optimized conditions, our laser system emitting at » 2.1 µm reaches an output power of 112 W with 54.6-% optical-to-optical efficiency and an M 2 = 1.1. This system is ideally suited for future direct modelocking at the 100 W level, as well as for ultrafast amplification. We start the discussion with a review of the state-of-the-art of TDLs emitting directly in the vicinity of 2 µm, and then discuss difficulties and possible routes both towards ultrafast operation and next possible steps for power scaling.
Ultrafast laser systems operating with high-average power in the wavelength range from 1.9 µm to 3 µm are of interest for a wide range of applications for example in spectroscopy, material processing and as drivers for secondary sources in the XUV spectral region. In this area, laser systems based on holmium-doped gain materials directly emitting at 2.1 µm have made significant progress over the past years, however so far only very few results were demonstrated in power-scalable high-power laser geometries. In particular, the thin-disk geometry is promising for directly modelocked oscillators with high average power levels that are comparable to amplifier systems at MHz repetition rate. In this paper, we demonstrate Semiconductor Saturable Absorber Mirror (SESAM) modelocked Ho:YAG thindisk lasers (TDLs) emitting at 2.1-µm wavelength with record-holding performance levels. In our highest average power configuration, we reach 50 W of average power, with 1.13-ps pulses, 2.11 µJ of pulse energy and ~1.9 MW of peak power. To the best of our knowledge, this represents the highest average power, as well as the highest output pulse energy so far demonstrated from a modelocked laser in the 2-µm wavelength region. This record performance level was enabled by the recent development of high-power GaSb-based SESAMs with low loss, adapted for high intracavity power and pulse energy. We also explore the limitations in terms of reaching shorter pulse durations at high power with this gain material in the disk geometry and using SESAM modelocking, and present first steps in this direction, with the demonstration of 30 W of output power, with 692-fs pulses in another laser configuration. In the near future, with the development of a next generation of SESAM samples for this wavelength region, we believe higher pulse energy approaching the 10-µJ regime, and sub-500-fs pulses should be straightforward to reach using SESAM modelocking.
High average power femtosecond lasers have made spectacular progress in the last decades – moving from laboratory-based systems with maximum average powers of tens of watts to kilowatt-class mature industrial systems in a short time. The availability of such systems opens new possibilities in many fields; one of the most prominent ones that have driven many of these technological advances is precise high-speed material processing, where ultrashort pulses have long been recognized to provide highest precision processing of virtually any material, and high average power extends these capabilities to highest processing rates. Here, we focus our attention on one high-average power technology with large unexplored potential for this specific application: directly modelocked multi-MHz repetition frequency high-power thin-disk oscillators. We review their latest state-of-the-art and discuss future directions and challenges, specifically with this application field in mind.
We report on an in-band pumped SESAM mode-locked Ho:CALGO bulk laser with a record-high average power of 8.7 W and an optical-to-optical efficiency of 38.2% at a central wavelength of 2.1 µm. At this power level, the bulk laser generates pulses with a duration of 369 fs at an 84.4-MHz repetition rate, corresponding to a pulse energy of 103 nJ and a peak power of 246 kW. To the best of our knowledge, this is the highest average power and pulse energy directly generated from a mode-locked bulk laser in the 2-3 µm wavelength region. Our current results indicate that Ho:CALGO is a competitive candidate for average power scaling of 2-µm femtosecond lasers.
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