Fiber laser mode-locked with a semiconductor saturable absorber etalon operating in transmission

Author

Isomäki, Antti ; Guina, Mircea D. ; Tuomisto, Pietari ; Okhotnikov, Oleg G.

Author_Institution

Tampere Univ. of Technol.

Volume

18

Issue

20

fYear

2006

Firstpage

2150

Lastpage

2152

Abstract

We demonstrate a ring cavity ytterbium fiber laser mode-locked with a semiconductor saturable absorber used in transmission. The resonant cavity-enhanced nonlinear response corresponding to the low-loss transmission state enables a robust self-starting mode-locking. Such a transfer function is opposite to that of the resonant absorber operating in the reflection mode, where the highest modulation depth matches the high-loss state. The device ensures ultrashort pulse operation with the wavelength self-adjusted to the optimal value corresponding to the low-loss state of the laser cavity. When using a saturable absorber etalon in transmission mode, the mode-locking mechanism is also highly tolerant to the total cavity dispersion

Keywords

fibre lasers; laser cavity resonators; laser mode locking; optical saturable absorption; ring lasers; ytterbium; laser mode locking; modulation depth; resonant cavity-enhanced nonlinear response; ring cavity ytterbium fiber laser; semiconductor saturable absorber etalon; transmission loss-state; Fiber lasers; Laser mode locking; Optical pulses; Optical reflection; Resonance; Ring lasers; Robustness; Semiconductor lasers; Transfer functions; Ytterbium; Mode-locked lasers; optical fiber lasers; quantum-well devices; ultrafast optics;

fLanguage

English

Journal_Title

Photonics Technology Letters, IEEE

Publisher

ieee

ISSN

1041-1135

Type

jour

DOI

10.1109/LPT.2006.883894

Filename

1705514