Design of wavelength-switching erbium-doped fiber lasers with a multimode fiber Bragg grating using spatial-mode excitation and selection techniques

A multimode fiber Bragg grating (MMFBG)-based wavelength-switching erbium-doped fiber laser and its application in displacement sensing is proposed and demonstrated. According to the spatial-mode distribution in the multimode fiber (MMF), the modes reflected by the MMFBG at different wavelengths build a wavelength-dependent mode field on the transverse plane of the MMF. By varying spatial-launching position of the single-mode fiber against the MMFBG to achieve different mode group excitation and selection, single-wavelength lasing at 31 discrete wavelengths has been realized over a wide wavelength range.