Coherent combining of ultrashort fiber-amplified laser pulses

Enrico Seise; Arno Klenke; Sven Breitkopf; Marco Plötner; Jens Limpert; Andreas Tünnermann

doi:10.1117/12.874769

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21 February 2011 Coherent combining of ultrashort fiber-amplified laser pulses

Enrico Seise; Arno Klenke; Sven Breitkopf; Marco Plötner; Jens Limpert; Andreas Tünnermann

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Proceedings Volume 7914, Fiber Lasers VIII: Technology, Systems, and Applications; 79141D (2011) https://doi.org/10.1117/12.874769
Event: SPIE LASE, 2011, San Francisco, California, United States

Abstract

We report on a novel concept to scale the performance of ultra-fast lasers by means of coherent combination. Pulses from a single mode-locked laser are distributed to a number of spatially separated fiber amplifiers and coherently combined after amplification. The splitting and combination process is based on the polarization combining technique using polarization cubes. A Hansch-Couillaud detector measures the polarization state of the combined beam. The error signal (deviation from linear polarization) is used to stabilize the optical path lengths in the different channels with a piezo mounted mirror. In a proof-of-principle experiment the combination of two femtosecond fiber-based amplifiers in a CPA systems is presented. A combining efficiency as high as 97% has been achieved. Additional measurements were carried out to investigate the stability of the system. The concept offers a unique scaling potential and can be applied to all ultrafast amplification schemes independent of the architecture of the gain medium.

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Enrico Seise, Arno Klenke, Sven Breitkopf, Marco Plötner, Jens Limpert, and Andreas Tünnermann "Coherent combining of ultrashort fiber-amplified laser pulses", Proc. SPIE 7914, Fiber Lasers VIII: Technology, Systems, and Applications, 79141D (21 February 2011); https://doi.org/10.1117/12.874769

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