55-fs pulse generation without wave-breaking from an all-fiber Erbium-doped ring laser

Abstract

We demonstrate the direct generation of 55 fs pulses from an all-fiber Erbium-doped ring laser oscillator using the nonlinear polarization rotation mode-locking. The average output power is 56.4 mW but limited by available pump power of 330 mW. The linear chirped pulse duration is 55 fs after recompression using standard single-mode fiber. The pulses show to resist optical wave breaking with a smooth spectrum without any side lobe and cw-breakthrough. This all-fiber laser exhibits relatively high transfer efficiency of 17% and the single pulse energy reaches 1.5 nJ.

Fiber-based laser frequency combs

“…During each roundtrip only the high-intensity pulse peak is transmitted by the polarizer, just like in the case of NALM/NOLM. The nonlinear polarization rotation mechanism currently allows pulses as short as 55 fs from dispersion-managed Erdoped fiber lasers [6]. Up till now, the highest repetition rates from all-fiber NPR lasers in ring resonators were achieved in our group.…”

“…Typically, very broad gain media are used for ultra-short pulse lasers, like Ti:Sapphire, Yb:KGW, Yb:fiber, Er:fiber, Er/Yb:glass, Cr:LiSaF. Their basic parameters and exemplary results achieved with those media are summarized in Table 1 [4][5][6][7][8][9][10]. The pulse temporal duration and spectral width are bound together with a parameter, called time-bandwidth product (TBP).…”

Direct Generation of 148 nm and 44.6 fs Pulses in an Erbium-Doped Fiber Laser

“…However, the spectral bandwidth is constrained to a few nanometers and thereby a broad pulse is often obtained owing Manuscript to the slow pulse-shaping mechanism induced by the saturable absorber [11]- [13]. In comparison, nonlinear polarization evolution (NPE) with intracavity polarizing elements is a promising method to generate ultrashort pulses with high fundamental repetition rates in ring lasers due to large modulation depth and rapid saturation absorption mechanism [14]- [19]. Furthermore, NPE based passive mode-locked fiber lasers often exhibit excellent noise characteristics and thereby low timing jitter in long-term stable operation [20], [21].…”

Chirped pulse amplified dissipative-soliton Erbium-doped fiber lasers

“…For example, 20 nJ, 810 fs soliton pulses can be emitted in a CPA system seeded by a graphene mode-locked soliton fiber laser [3]. CPA systems seeded by stretched pulses have also been reported, which can generate pulses with sub-100 fs duration [4]. Similaritons have also been employed in a CPA system: high-quality pulses can be generated, benefitting from linear chirp of similaritons [5].…”