We demonstrate a highly-Yb-doped fiber with pedestal and triple-cladding stretching fiber for utilizing in chirped pulses amplification systems with high ratio of stretching/compression and low level of stimulated Raman scattering. The stretching triple-cladding fiber consisting of high-index Ge-doped core, low-index F-doped depression concentric layer and high-index Ge-doped concentric layer. By varying the fiber structure parameters (refractive indexes and geometrical size) we were able to tailor its dispersion parameter and its slope values in order to match these with a grating-pair compressor ones to obtain better pulse compression quality (shortest possible duration and pedestal-free structure). Realized fiber has dispersion parameter of -140 ps/nm/km at 1026 nm and slope of 12 um^-1. The highly-Yb-doped fiber for the final amplification stage of the CPA has aluminophosphorosilicate glass core with a germanium-doped pedestal around it; core/pedestal diameters were 14/50 um, outer cladding has square shape with edge size of 130 um. Despite of high Yb ions content (cladding absorption of 40 dB/m at 976 nm) the core NA was only 0.09 due to the creation of the pedestal. We utilized a 23 cm piece of the fiber to amplify 22ps chirped pulses with 1.432 MHz repetition rate up to 10.2W of average power, when the first stokes of Raman starts to evolve, corresponding to 320 kW of peak power. The pump-to-signal conversion efficiency was 64%. M2 factor was 1.15/1.12. Experiments on amplification of the 500 ps chirped pulses and its compression will be presented at the conference.
A tapered Er-doped fiber amplifier for high peak power pulses amplification has been developed and tested. The core diameter changed from 15.8 µm (mode field diameter (MFD) 14.5 µm) to 93 µm (MFD 40 µm) along 3.7 meters maintaining single-mode performance at 1555 nm (according to the S2-method, the part of the power of high-order modes does not exceed 1.5 %). The amplification of 0.9 ns pulses with spectral width below 0.04 nm up to a peak power above 200 kW (limited by self-phase modulation) with a slope pump-to-signal conversion efficiency of 15.6% was demonstrated.
In this paper we systematically study a limitation for maximum of Yb dopant concentration in silica based fibers. Two the most popular glass matrixes (F-Al2O3-SiO2 and Al2O3-P2O5-SiO2) were thoroughly investigated in this respect. A possibility to introduce ultra-high doping level of Yb2O3 (in excess of 2.5 mol%) with a relatively low optical losses in fibers was demonstrated. At the same time it was investigated that at ultra-high Yb concentration in the fiber core even with maintaining very low background losses (both initial and induced by photodarkening) such a fiber can nearly completely lose its active properties. Optimal glass matrixes and optimal concentration of Yb dopant in the glass core, which allow keep up lasing properties of the developed fibers high, were studied. An ultra-short length fiber amplifier (~3.5 cm) based on the developed Al2O3-P2O5-SiO2 glass core fiber doped with 1.2 mol% of Yb2O3 (Yb ions absorption was about 1000 dB/m at 920 nm) was created.
In the paper we discuss current state of the art in the field of tapered fiber development. The best results in term of high peak and high average power achieved with this type of fibers are presented together with requirements to the tapered fiber amplifier design. The report is mainly focused on tapered fiber amplifiers operated near 1 μm (Yb-doped tapered fibers), but also extension of this technique to 1.55 μm spectral range is discussed.
Highly doped with ytterbium (up to 20 wt% of Yb2O3) Er-Yb aliminosilicate glass core fibers have been fabricated and thoroughly investigated. It has been discovered that in a particular condition the lasing properties of both Yb and Er ions can be nearly completely suppressed. Due to a very high Yb ions absorption in the 900-1000 nm range (~ 3000 dB/m at 915 nm) all together with low background losses the developed glass matrix is very promising for such applications as pump isolation in fiber lasers as well as spectral and mode filtering using highly absorbing glass dopants.
In this paper, we demonstrate possibility of simultaneous achievement of high peak and high average power in picosecond pulses using a monolithic amplifier based on a long Yb-doped tapered fiber. Due to a very high pump absorption (~ 25 dB/m at 976 nm) in the realized 2.4 m long tapered fiber most of the pump is absorbed near the thick tapered fiber end and a very small fraction of pump power reaches thin fiber end. As a result, signal passes through the thin part of the tapered fiber without an amplification and exhibits fast growth only near the output tapered fiber end, where a mode field diameter is large (35 μm at 1064 nm for 46 μm output core diameter), so that pulses can be amplified to a high peak power. Moreover, only a negligible fraction of pump radiation leaks at the conic part of the tapered fiber, because its most part was absorbed in the thick tapered fiber part. Thus a safe operation without polymer burning at a leakage point is possible up to a very high pump power. The developed tapered fiber was used in a final amplification stage of the all-fiber pulsed laser system, which allowed us to amplify 8.3 ps pulses with repetition rate of 18.4 MHz and central wavelength of 1064 nm to 150 W of average power and 0.92 MW peak power. The average power level was limited only by available pump power (230 W): no signs of transverse mode instability effects were observed.
Single-mode Er-Yb fibers based on phosphorosilicate glass matrix highly doped with fluorine have been fabricated using modified all-gas phase MCVD technology. Fibers have core doped by 6.5 mol.% of P2O5, 0.9 wt.% of F and different concentration of Er and Yb. The core NA was about 0.07-0.08 relative to the pure silica level. Slope efficiency of more than 19% was achieved using amplifier scheme with co-propagating pump at 976 nm and signal at 1555 nm (input signal power was about 0.6W). Slope efficiency in the laser configuration has reached 34% relative to the input pump power.
Monolithic 976 nm laser design based on a newly developed saddle-shaped Yb-doped fiber has been proposed. The fiber has central single-mode part with core diameter of about 12 μm and ultra-thin square-shaped clad with side of about 42x42 μm. At the both ends of the saddle-shaped fiber the core and the clad sizes were adiabatically increased up to 20/(70x70) μm and the fiber could be spliced with standard (80..125 μm clad) passive fibers using commercially available equipment. Single-mode laser at 976 nm based on the developed fiber has been fabricated and photodarkening-free operation with output power of 10.6 W, which is the record high for all-fiber laser schemes, has been demonstrated.
Chirped pulse monolithic fiber amplifier based on a newly developed tapered polarization maintaining Yb-doped fiber has been developed and optimized. A novel amplification regime in a relatively long (220 cm) tapered fiber of improved design, which has been theoretically predicted, allowed us to achieve an ultimate high peak power. In this regime, the signal propagates most of the fiber without amplification and growths very rapidly only in the last 80 cm of the tapered fiber, which has a mode field area of approximately 1000 μm2 near the output. We have demonstrated amplification of 20 ps chirped pulses centered at 1056-nm with spectral width of 20 nm to 0.7 MW peak power directly from the tapered fiber amplifier. The pulses had a diffraction limited quality (M2 ~ 1.124) and could be compressed down to 350 fs with 50% efficiency. In addition, amplification of narrow-band 9 ps pulses centered at 1064 nm to a peak power of 1.8 MW directly from the tapered fiber amplifier was demonstrated.
Experimental observation of a novel effect of long-term mode shape degradation in a high peak power ytterbium-doped pulsed fiber lasers based on large mode area step-index fibers has been reported for the first time. It is shown, that the degradation is caused by power coupling from LP01 to LP11 mode, occurring on a long period refractive index grating (LPG) formed in the active fiber core. The photo-darkening process was found to play a significant role in the formation of a LPG.
An all-glass Yb-doped single-mode fiber laser and amplifier with output power of more than 5 W near 977 nm have been realized. Both laser and amplifier were based on a specially developed photodarking-free Yb-doped fibers with increased core-to-clad diameter ratio (up to 0.31).
In this work we present a monolithic lidar system, based on a newly-developed double-clad large mode area (LMA) polarization-maintaining Er-doped fiber and specially designed LMA passive components. Optimization of the fiber designs resulted in as high as 100 W of SBS limited peak power. The amplifier and its passive components (circulator and collimator) were integrated in an existing lidar system. The enhanced lidar system provides three times increase of scanning range compared to one based on standard telecom-grade amplifiers.
We proposed and investigated a novel tapered ytterbium-doped fiber design. The tapered fiber has length of 2.1 m, single-mode thin end and thick end with core/clad diameter of about 50/430 µm. Master-oscillator power-amplifier monolithic fiber scheme have been developed using this fiber and 5 ps duration, 28 nm spectral width and 0.5 MW peak power pulses was achieved at the output. FROG measurements reveal linear chirp that allow one to expect decompression of these pulses down to sub-100 fs duration.
We have studied the photodarkening effect in fiber preforms with an ytterbium-doped aluminosilicate glass core. The room-temperature stable Yb2+ ions formation in the glass matrix under both UV- and NIR-pumping irradiation was revealed by the method of absorption spectra analysis and the fluorescence spectroscopy technique. Comparative studies of preforms and crystals samples luminescence spectra, obtained under UV-excitation, were performed. A general mechanism of Yb2+ ions and aluminium oxygen-hole centers (Al-OHC) formation as a result of photoinduced process of Yb3+ ions excitation to "charge-transfer state" (CTS) was found for both Yb:YAG crystal and aluminosilicate glass.
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