Dual-comb thin-disk oscillator

Abstract

Dual-comb spectroscopy (DCS) normally operates with two independent, relatively low power and actively synchronized laser sources. This hinders the wide adoption for practical implementations and frequency conversion into deep UV and VUV spectral ranges. Here, we report a fully passive, high power dual-comb laser based on thin-disk technology and its application to direct frequency comb spectroscopy. The peak power (1.2 MW) and the average power (15 W) of our Yb:YAG thin-disk dual-comb system are more than one-order-of-magnitude higher than in any previous systems. The scheme allows easy adjustment of the repetition frequency difference during operation. Both combs share all cavity components which leads to an excellent mutual stability. A time-domain signal recorded over 10 ms without any active stabilization was sufficient to resolve individual comb lines after Fourier transformation.

Picosecond ultrasonics with a free-running dual-comb laser

“…Compared to our previous solid-state dual-comb demonstration [82], here we demonstrate a significantly performance-improved free-running dual-comb laser oscillator delivering 1.8 W of average power at 80-MHz repetition rate at a pulse duration of 110 fs from each output comb; this corresponds to a peak power enhancement of more than ten times. Although higher average power free-running dual-comb laser oscillators using thin-disk geometry have been demonstrated recently [89,90], here we demonstrate the highest power free-running dual-comb bulk oscillator to date. The bulk laser geometry is highly relevant for practical applications of such lasers as it enables compact and cost-effective optical sensor development.…”

A Decade of Sub‐100‐fs Thin‐Disk Laser Oscillators

“…[65] The high average power from the laser oscillator has also been harnessed by single-cavity dual-comb systems. [66,67] Another very important potential of TDL oscillators is driving nonlinear processes at extremely high intensities directly inside the laser cavity such as intraoscillator HHG. [68][69][70] In Section 6 we provide a quick overview of these application areas for sub-100-fs TDLs.…”

“…The first steps on this path were made in 2019 [ 66 ] by the demonstration of the highest average power dual‐comb laser based on a KLM TDL oscillator. The dual‐comb cavity was based on splitting both end mirrors while the rest of the cavity components remained shared.…”

“…TDL oscillators are promising sources for this purpose since their high peak power allows for efficient nonlinear conversion toward MIR or UV wavelengths, which are of high interest for many spectroscopy applications. [120,121] The first steps on this path were made in 2019 [66] by the demonstration of the highest average power dual-comb laser based on a KLM TDL oscillator. The dual-comb cavity was based on splitting both end mirrors while the rest of the cavity components remained shared.…”

Entanglement-enhanced dual-comb spectroscopy

“…In our analyses, we will ignore phase noise, since various dualcomb noise suppression techniques have been developed, based on comb-source engineering [51][52][53] , digital phase correction 22,31,45 , and active stabilization 21 , with some of them achieving coherent times up to hours 21,22,45 .…”