This PDF file contains the front matter associated with SPIE Proceedings Volume 9728 including the Title Page, Copyright information, Table of Contents, Introduction, and Conference Committee listing.

We report results from two ~1.5 kW Yb-doped fiber amplifiers with comparable optical to optical efficiencies and linewidths. One amplifier utilized a fiber with a core diameter of 25 μm while the core diameter of the fiber utilized in the other amplifier was 20 μm. Stimulated Brillouin scattering (SBS) suppression in both cases was achieved through pseudo-random bit sequence (PRBS) phase modulation. While the power generated in the larger core fiber was modal instability (MI) limited, no sign of MI was observed in the smaller core fiber. This may allow us to utilize the higher MI threshold fiber to scale further while maintaining sufficiently narrow linewidth for beam combining. Furthermore, in a demonstration of the utility of applying a thermal gradient in conjunction with phase modulation to suppress SBS further, we report on a 1 kW amplifier driven at a PRBS clock rate of 2 GHz. Finally, we compare the coherent beam combining properties of amplifiers seeded with PRBS phase modulated sources to those seeded with white noise sources.

The recent development of soliton femtosecond fiber lasers emitting at 2.8 μm opens a new avenue for the generation of ultrashort pulses in the mid-infrared spectral region. In this paper, we investigate the peak power scalability of such lasers. By optimizing the output coupling ratio and the length of the Er³⁺: fluoride fiber in the cavity, we demonstrate the generation of 270-fs pulses with an energy of 7 nJ and an estimated peak power of 23 kW. These record performances at 2.8 μm surpass by far those obtained from standard soliton lasers at 1.55 μm. A numerical model of the laser including the effect of the intracavity atmospheric absorption is also presented. Numerical simulations agree well with the experimental results and suggest that the atmospheric propagation in the cavity could prevent the laser from self-starting in a mode-locked regime. This femtosecond laser could be the building block for simple and compact mid-infrared frequency combs and supercontinuum sources.

Power scaling investigation of a narrow-linewidth, Ytterbium-doped all-fiber amplifier operating at 1034 nm is presented. Nonlinear stimulated Brillouin scattering (SBS) effects were suppressed through the utilization of an external phase modulation technique. Here, the power amplifier was seeded with a spectrally broadened master oscillator and the results were compared using both pseudo-random bit sequence (PRBS) and white noise source (WNS) phase modulation formats. By utilizing an optical band pass filter as well as optimizing the length of fiber used in the pre-amplifier stages, we were able to appreciably suppress unwanted amplified spontaneous emission (ASE). Notably, through PRBS phase modulation, greater than two-fold enhancement in threshold power was achieved when compared to the WNS modulated case. Consequently, by further optimizing both the power amplifier length and PRBS pattern at a clock rate of 3.5 GHz, we demonstrated 1 kilowatt of power with a slope efficiency of 81% and an overall ASE content of less than 1%. Beam quality measurements at 1 kilowatt provided near diffraction-limited operation (M² < 1.2) with no sign of modal instability. To the best of our knowledge, the power scaling results achieved in this work represent the highest power reported for a spectrally narrow all-fiber amplifier operating at < 1040 nm in Yb-doped silica-based fiber.

Laser gain competition was used in conjunction with external phase modulation techniques in order to investigate power scaling of narrow-linewidth monolithic Ytterbium-doped fiber amplifiers. In this study, both pseudo-random bit sequence (PRBS) and filtered white noise source (WNS) modulation techniques were separately utilized to drive the external phase modulator for linewidth broadening. The final-stage amplifier was then seeded with the phase modulated narrow-linewidth 1064 nm signal along with a spectrally broader 1038 nm source. Consequently, integration of laser gain competition in conjunction with PRBS phase modulation yields a factor of ∼15 dB in stimulated Brillouin scattering (SBS) threshold enhancement at a clock rate of 2.5 GHz; leading to 1 kilowatt of output power with 85% optical efficiency at 1064 nm. Notably, the combination of PRBS phase modulation with laser gain competition provided superior enhancement in SBS threshold power when compared to the WNS modulated case. The beam quality at maximum power was near the diffraction limit (M² <1.2) with no sign of modal instability. Overall, the power scaling results represent a significant reduction in spectral linewidth compared to that of commercially available narrowlinewidth Ytterbium-doped fiber amplifiers.

A 2 kw single-mode fiber laser with a 20-m long delivery fiber and high back reflection resistance has been demonstrated. An Yb-doped fiber with large core size and differential modal gain is used to realize high SRS suppression and single-mode operation simultaneously. The 20 m-long delivery fiber gives flexibility to the design of processing systems. An output power of 2 kW is achieved at a pump power of 2.86 kW. The slope efficiency is 70%. The power of the Stokes light is less than -50 dB below the laser power at the output power of 2 kW even with a 20-m delivery fiber. Nearly diffraction-limited beam quality is also confirmed (M² = 1.2). An output power of 3 kW is believed to be achieved by increasing pumping power. The back reflection resistance properties of the fabricated singlemode fiber laser is evaluated numerically by the SRS gain calculated from measured laser output spectra and fiber characteristics. The acceptable power of the back reflection light into the fiber core is estimated to be 500 W which is high enough for processing of highly reflective materials. The output power fluctuation caused by SRS and back reflection in materials processing will be well suppressed. Our high power single-mode fiber lasers can provide high quality and stable processing of highly reflective materials.

We investigate high brightness pumping of multi-kW fiber amplifier in a bi-directional pumping configuration. Each pump outputs 2 kW in a 200 μm, 0.2 NA multi-mode fiber. Specialty gain fibers, with 17 μm MFD and 5-dB/meter pump absorption, have been developed. The maximum fiber amplifier output power is 2550 W, limited by multi-mode instability, with 90% O-O efficiency and M² < 1.15. The fiber amplifier linewidth is <12 GHz. We also present kW fiber amplifier results using gain fiber with metalized fiber coating.

Operation from 1030nm to 1070nm in single narrow linewidth fiber amplifier with >1.5kW output power is presented. The fiber amplifier has up to 3m output cable for <15GHz linewidth. The fiber amplifier in the ruggedized compact modular package has 40% wall-plug efficiency. The spectral dependence of higher order mode instability threshold is described.

We present a novel metal coated triple clad active fibre design, utilising an all glass inner cladding structure and aluminium outer coating. This metal coated active fibre enables a number of benefits to high power laser design, such as increase robustness and extended operating temperature range. As a demonstration of the advantages of this design a passively cooled ytterbium fibre laser is presented. A 20 m length of active fibre was coiled into a planar arrangement and mounted onto a high emissivity heatsink. Up to 405 W of output power was achieved without the need for active water or forced air cooling. The slope efficiency of this source was 74 % and maximum outer heat sink temperature was ~140°C. This arrangement allowed for significant weight and size savings to be achieved with the active fibre laser head weighing less than 100 g. We will discuss the design choices and trade-offs of metal coated active fibre on high power fibre laser systems as well as the prospects for further power scaling to the kW level.

Spatio-temporal instability of the fundamental mode in Yb³⁺-doped few-mode PM fiber amplifiers with a core diameter of 8-10 μm was studied experimentally and theoretically. The mode instability threshold was registered at 1-100 Watts pump power. The threshold was found to decrease dramatically in the presence of a backward reflection of the signal from the output fiber end or an external counter-propagating beam; an increase of the signal bandwidth or input power resulted in the increase of the threshold. Numerical simulation revealed a self-consistent growth of the higher-order mode and a traveling electronic index grating accompanying the population grating induced by the mode interference field (due to different polarizability of the excited and unexcited Yb³⁺ ions).

In this work we present guidelines to increase the transverse mode instability threshold of high power fiber amplifiers and also, for the first time to the best of our knowledge, of fiber oscillators. These guidelines do not involve changes in the composition of the active material (except for its doping concentration), but they can still lead to a significant increase of the transverse mode instability threshold. The dependence of this parameter on the active ion concentration, the core conformation, the pump configuration and the mirror reflectivities in a fiber oscillator will be studied and discussed.

We use a detailed numerical model of stimulated thermal Rayleigh scattering to compare mode instability thresholds in cladding pumped Tm³⁺-doped and Yb³⁺-doped fiber amplifiers. The Tm-doped fiber amplifies 2040 nm light using a 790 nm pump; the Yb-doped fiber amplifies 1060 nm light using a 976 nm pump. The predicted instability threshold of the Tm-doped fiber is found to be higher than that of the Yb-doped fiber, even though its heat load is much higher. We attribute the higher threshold in part to its longer signal wavelength, and in part to stronger gain saturation.

The maximum average power that can be emitted from an ytterbium-doped fiber-laser system is estimated. The analysis takes into account all the effects known so far that may limit the average power including transverse mode instabilities and photo darkening. Hereby, the recent experimental observation that transverse mode instabilities depend on the average heat load in a fiber amplifier is exploited. The results of this analysis show that there are three main limiting effects: stimulated Raman scattering, the brightness of the pump laser and transverse mode instabilities. Moreover, the analysis suggests that, disregarding possible practical constrains, the average output power of a fiber laser system can be, in principle, increased up to 70kW.

This paper describes a numerical method of accurately modeling large pitch rod type photonic crystal fiber amplifiers taking into account a converged solution to the thermo-optic feedback loop. This method also accounts for the possibility of asymmetric doping profiles and directly treats higher order mode stimulated thermal Rayleigh scattering gain competition along the entire length of the amplifier. Example applications are described. This approach enables further fiber design optimization to increase peak and average amplifier power outputs.

We report on the design and the fabrication of a new design of an all-solid Bragg fiber based on the pixelization and heterostructuration of a cladding made of only two high index rings. The thickness of the low index ring as well as the geometry of the heterostructuration (its symmetry and the number of removed pixels) have been chosen to maximize the confinement losses of the Higher Order Modes (HOM) (above 10 dB/m) while keeping the Fundamental Mode (FM) losses low (below 0.1 dB/m). The proposed geometry allows having access to different Mode Field Diameter (MFD) from 54 μm to 60 μm at 1 μm wavelength by drawing the same stack to different fiber (and hence, core) diameters. As a result, a record MFD of 60 μm is reported for a Solid Core Photonic Bandgap Fiber (SC-PBGF) and single-mode behavior is obtained experimentally even for a short fiber length (few tens centimeters) maintained straight.

In this communication, the authors report on the first high power emission obtained using a solid non-filamented core fully-aperiodic large pitch fiber manufactured by the REPUSIL method which is based on the sintering and vitrification of micrometric doped silica powders. Using a simple laser cavity, an average output power of 252 W was achieved for the first time in such a fiber with an available pump power of 400 W, corresponding to an optical-to-optical efficiency of 63 %. The M² measurements have shown an excellent beam quality with values close to 1.4 at full power and lower than 1.3 for signal power lower than 215 W.

An improved version of the distributed modal filtering (DMF) rod fiber is tested in a high power setup delivering 350 W/m of extracted signal average power limited by the available pump power. The rod fiber is thoroughly tested to record the transverse modal instability (TMI) behavior and also measure degradation of the TMI threshold with operation time due to induced absorption in the active material increasing the thermo-optical heat load. Multiple testing degrades the rod fiber and TMI threshold from >360 W to a saturated power level of roughly 240 W.

The incorporation of semiconductor materials into the optical fiber geometry provides an important step towards enhancing the optoelectronic functionality of conventional fiber infrastructures, as well as allowing for the construction of robust devices with novel waveguiding properties. In this paper we review our progress in characterizing the nonlinear transmission properties of semiconductor optical fibers with the view to developing integrated all-optical devices. The nonlinear performance of the fibers has been benchmarked through demonstrations of high speed all-optical wavelength conversion, modulation, and continuum generation.

We report mid-infrared supercontinuum (SC) generation in a dispersion-engineered step-index indium fluoride fiber pumped by a femtosecond fiber laser near 2 μm. The SC spans 1.8 octaves from 1.25 μm to 4.6 μm with an average output power of 270 mW. The pump source is an all-fiber femtosecond laser that generates sub-100 fs pulses at 50 MHz repetition rate with 570 mW average power. The indium fluoride fiber used for SC generation is designed to have a zerodispersion wavelength close to 1.9 μm. Two fiber lengths of 30 cm and 55 cm are selected for the SC generation experiments based on the numerical modelling results. The measured spectra and the numerical modelling results are presented showing good agreement for both lengths. The femtosecond pumping regime is a key requirement for generating a coherent SC. We show by modelling that the SC is coherent for a pump with the same pulse width and energy as our fiber laser and added quantum-limited noise. The results are promising for the realization of coherent and high-repetition-rate SC sources, two conditions that are critical for spectroscopy applications using FTIR spectrometers. Additionally, the entire SC system is built using optical fibers with similar core diameters, which enables integration into a compact platform.

Over the past years, Thulium (Tm) -doped fiber lasers in the 2μm region have gained a lot of interest due to many potential applications in materials processing and biophotonics. Based on the broad gain regions spanning from 1800nm to 2100nm, they offer the perfect basis to implement broadly tunable and user-friendly light sources like they are increasingly demanded in spectroscopic applications. Recently, a novel tuning mechanism based on a fiber Bragg grating (FBG) array as versatile spectral filter has been reported. This concept combines unique spectral freedom for customized tuning ranges and ultrabroad bandwidths with a fiber-integrated setup in order to maintain the advantages of the waveguide geometry. In this work, we demonstrate such a dispersion tuned and pulsed fiber laser in the Tm domain around 1950nm using a modulator and a discrete FBG array to control the emission wavelength. In order to comply with the demands of potential applications in biophotonics, for the first time, this tuning concept is realized in a polarization maintaining (PM) configuration ensuring linearly polarized output. While a simple FBG array is employed containing five gratings inscribed in PM fiber, we also outline the prospect to implement FBGs fabricated in a standard single mode fiber. The emission characteristics of the system are investigated showing pulse durations down to 11ns and a good spectral signal contrast. In order to highlight the prospect for tunable high-power operation, we have also implemented an amplification stage scaling the average power to more than 25W.

Spectral beam combining of Tm-doped fiber lasers can increase the laser output power while simultaneously maintaining the single mode beam quality. We report on a spectral beam combining technique based on highly efficient in-housemade WDM cascade. We demonstrate continuous wave power combining employing a WDM cascade consisting of four fiber laser sources with emission wavelengths of 1920, 1949, 1996 and 2030 nm. A combined power of up to 38 W resulted in a combining efficiency of 69%.

We present measurements of the temperature increase inside the active fiber of a thulium fiber amplifier during high power operation. At a pump power of over 100 W at a wavelength of 793 nm, we measure the core temperature distribution along the first section of a large mode area (LMA) highly thulium doped active fiber by use of an optical backscatter reflectometer. A mode field adaptor is used to maintain single mode operation in the LMA fiber. An increase in temperature of over 100 K can be observed in spite of conductive cooling, located at the pumped fiber end and jeopardizing the fiber coating. The recoated splice can be clearly identified as the hottest fiber region. This allows us to estimate the maximum thermally acceptable pump power for this amplifier. We also observe that the temperature can be decreased by increasing the seed power, which is in agreement with theoretical predictions on the increase of cross relaxation efficiency by depletion of the upper laser level. This underlines the role of power scaling of the respective seed power of a thulium amplifier stage as a means of thermal management.

For the first time, an electronically-controlled, wavelength-agile tuneable holmium-doped fibre laser is presented. A narrow-band acousto-optic tuneable filter was characterized and used as the wavelength selective element to avoid any inertial effects associated with opto-mechanical tuning mechanisms. We demonstrate operation over a 90 nm wavelength range spanning 2040 – 2130 nm. The laser produced >150 mW over this entire range with a signal-to-noise ratio of >45 dB and line-width of ~0.16 nm. Switching times of ~35 μs and sweep rates of up to 9 nm/ms were also demonstrated.

We demonstrate herein a PM-fiber based cavity design capable of supporting many different pulse dynamics, such as soliton propagation or dissipative solitons in a dispersion managed cavity. By changing the dispersion of the fiber Bragg grating of the cavity we modify the net cavity dispersion, and thus stimulate various pulse dynamics. In particular we demonstrate the first net normal cavity, all-PM, all-fiber, dipersion managed cavity operating the in the 2μm range. Furthermore, we also demonstrate an all-fiber all-PM MOPA system capable of delivering up to 6 W of average power at 16 MHz by direct amplification of 70 ps long narrowband pulses. The amplifier stages are not fully saturated and are currently limited by the pump power available.

Thulium and holmium have become the rare earth dopants of choice for generating 2 micron laser light in silica fiber. The majority of Tm:fiber lasers are pumped with high power diodes at 790nm and rely upon cross-relaxation processes to achieve optical-to-optical efficiencies of 55-65%. Tm:fiber lasers can also be pumped at <1900nm by another Tm:fiber laser to minimize quantum defect, reaching efficiencies >90%. Ho:fiber lasers are similarly pumped by Tm:fiber lasers at 1900-1950nm, with <70% typical efficiency. In this work, Tm:fiber and Ho:fiber lasers are in-band pumped using the same experimental setup to directly compare their performance as 2 micron sources.

A nanoparticle (NP) doping technique was used for making erbium-doped fibers (EDFs) for high energy lasers. The nanoparticles were doped into the silica soot of preforms, which were drawn into fibers. The Er luminescence lifetimes of the NP-doped cores are longer than those of corresponding solution-doped silica, and substantially less Al is incorporated into the NP-doped cores. Optical-to-optical slope efficiencies of greater than 71% have been measured. Initial investigations of stimulated Brillouin scattering (SBS) have indicated that SBS suppression is achieved by NP doping, where we observed a low intrinsic Brillouin gain coefficient, of ~1× 10^-11 m/W and the Brillouin bandwidth was increased by 2.5x compared to fused silica.

For the near IR spectral region from 1150 to 1800 nm, including the ranges from 1250 to 1500 nm and 1600 to 1800 nm where efficient rare-earth-doped fiber lasers don’t exist, bismuth-doped optical fibers are promising active materials. The last two spectral ranges are of great interest for some applications, in particular for optical fiber communication. Earlier, we developed Bi-doped fiber lasers and optical amplifiers operating in the first of these spectral ranges. Here, we report new results on the development of bismuth-doped optical fibers and fiber lasers for a spectral range of 1600-1800 nm.

We report theoretical and experimental study of tapered double-clad fibers (T-DCF) and consider various amplifiers and lasers using this fiber as a gain medium.

We demonstrate a 60μm core diameter single-trench Yb free Er-La-Al doped fiber having 0.038 ultra-low-NA, using conventional MCVD process in conjunction with solution doping process. Numerical simulations ensure an effective single mode, the effective area varies from 1,820μm² to 1,960μm² for different thicknesses of trenches and resonant rings. This fiber has been fabricated with conventional fabrication process, which can dramatically reduce the fabrication cost, hence suitable for mass production. Moreover, all solid structure ensures easy cleaving and splicing. Experimental measurements demonstrate a robust effective single mode operation. Furthermore, this fiber in 4%-4% laser cavity shows a record efficiency of 46% with respect to absorbed power.

We demonstrate on chirped pulse amplification of a dissipative soliton thulium-doped fiber laser. The system consists of an all-fiber seed laser, a fiber-based stretcher, two-stage fiber amplifier and a free space grating compressor. The oscillator works in the normal dispersion regime and delivers up-chirped pulses with output power of 3 mW at repetition rate of 29.3 MHz. The spectrum of the seed laser is located at 1938 nm with a 10 dB bandwidth of 50 nm. The output pulses are directly stretched in ~50 m normal dispersion fiber to 72 ps pulse duration. In the pre-amplifier and power amplifier, both forward pumping and backward pumping are tested in the experiment. Output power of 7 W has been achieved in the power amplifier with backward pumping corresponding to a pulse energy of 239 nJ, which has an amplification slope efficiency of 37.8%. The PER at the highest average output power was measured to be 19.5 dB. The amplified up-chirped pulses could be dechirped to a duration time of 121 fs with energy of 161 nJ using a pair of fused silica transmission gratings.

We compare large mode area (LMA) and single-mode (SM) double-clad fiber geometries for use in high power 1908nm fiber lasers. With a simple end-pumped architecture, we have generated 100W of 1908nm power with LMA fiber at 40% optical efficiency and 117W at 52.2% optical efficiency with single-mode fiber. We show the LMA fiber is capable of generating >200W and the SM fiber is capable of >300W at 1908nm. In all cases, the fiber lasers are monolithic power-oscillators with no free-space coupling.

Single-frequency fiber laser operating at 1950 nm has been demonstrated in an all-fiber distributed Bragg reflection (DBR) laser cavity by using a 1.9-cm commercial available Thulium-doped silica fiber, for the first time. The laser was pumped by a 793-nm single-mode diode laser and had a threshold pump power of 75 mW. The maximum output power of the single longitudinal mode laser was 18 mW and the slope efficiency with respect to the launched pump power was 11%. Moreover, the linewidth and relative intensity noise (RIN) at different pump power has been measured and analyzed. The successful demonstration with the Thulium-doped silica fiber used here is considered to further promote the commercialization of single frequency fiber laser at 2 μm.

We propose and demonstrate a tunable multi-wavelength Tm-doped mode-locked fiber laser. The mode-locked operation is enabled by nonlinear polarization evolution technique. The tunable operation and multi-wavelength laser emission is achieved by periodical cavity transmission modulation. The tunable range of dual-wavelength mode-locking is 1864 to 1916 nm and tri-wavelength mode-locking is 1863 to 1912 nm, respectively, which is the widest in multi-wavelength Tm-doped mode-locked fiber laser to the best of our knowledge. The system has compact structure and both the multi-wavelength laser emission and tunable operation can be realized by controlling the polarization in the fiber ring cavity.

Complementing ultrafast thulium-doped fiber-laser systems with a subsequent nonlinear pulse compression stage can enable unique laser parameters at around 2 μm operation wavelength. Significant pulse shortening and peak power enhancement have been accomplished using a fused silica solid-core fiber. In this fiber a pulse peak power of 24 MW was achieved without catastrophic damage due to self-focusing. As compared to operation in the well-explored 1 μm wavelength region, increasing the emission wavelength to 2 μm has a twofold advantage for nonlinear compression in fused-silica solid-core fibers. This is because, on the one hand the self-focusing limit scales quadratically with the wavelength. On the other hand the dispersion properties of fused silica allow for self-compression of ultrashort pulses beyond 1.3 μm wavelength, which leads to strong spectral broadening from very compact setups without the need for external compression. Using this technique we have generated 1.1 μJpulses with 24 fs FWHM pulse duration (<4 optical cycles), 24 MW peak power and 24.6 W of average power. To the best of our knowledge, this is the highest average power obtained from any nonlinear compression experiment around 2 μm wavelength and the first demonstration of peak powers beyond 20 MW within a fused-silica solid-core fiber. This result emphasizes that thulium-doped fiber-based chirped-pulse amplification systems may outperform their ytterbiumdoped counterparts in terms of peak power due to the fourfold increase of the critical power of self-focusing.

We present a spatial and temporal coherent-beam-combination system based on a fiber-integrated front-end, electro-optical components, and optical delay lines. The system features a larger scaling potential, enhanced stability and reduced alignment sensitivity compared to known divided-pulse amplification schemes. In a proof-of-principle experiment combining 4 pulses, a combining efficiency larger than 95% and a high amplitude stability are demonstrated. The efficiency is largely independent of the combined pulse energy and the temporal pulse contrast is better than 20 dB.

High power fiber lasers/amplifiers in the 1550nm spectral region have not scaled as rapidly as Yb-, Tm-, or Ho-doped fibers. This is primarily due to the low gain of the erbium ion. To overcome the low pump absorption, Yb is typically added as a sensitizer. Although this helps the pump absorption, it also creates a problem with parasitic lasing of the Yb ions under strong pumping conditions, which generally limits output power. Other pump schemes have shown high efficiency through resonant pumping of erbium only without the need for Yb as a sensitizer [1-2]. Although this can enable higher power scaling due to a decrease in the thermal loading, resonant pumping methods require long fiber lengths due to pump bleaching, which may limit the power scaling which can be achieved for single frequency output. By using an Er:Yb fiber and pumping in the minima of the Yb pump absorption at 940nm, we have been able to simultaneously generate high power, single frequency output at 1560nm while suppressing the 1-micron ASE and enabling higher efficiency compared to pumping at the absorption peak at 976nm. We have demonstrated single frequency amplification (540Hz linewidth) to 207W average output power with 49.3% optical efficiency (50.5% slope efficiency) in an LMA Er:Yb fiber. We believe this is the highest reported efficiency from a high power 9XXnm pumped Er:Yb-doped fiber amplifier. This is significantly more efficient that the best-reported efficiency for high power Er:Yb doped fibers, which, to-date, has been limited to ~41% slope efficiency [3].

We report on the measurement of the longitudinal temperature distribution in a fiber amplifier fiber during high power operation. The measurement signal of an optical frequency domain reflectometer is coupled to an ytterbium doped amplifier fiber via a wavelength division multiplexer. The longitudinal temperature distribution was examined for different pump powers with a sub mm resolution. The results show even small temperature variations induced by slight changes of the environmental conditions along the fiber. The mode instability threshold of the fiber under investigation was determined to be 480W and temperatures could be measured overall the measured output power values.

Thermal management is critical for kw-level power lasers, where mode instability driven by quantum defect heating is a major challenge. Tandem pumping using 1018nm fiber lasers are used to enable both high brightness and low quantum defect. It is, however, difficult to realize efficient 1018nm YDFL. The best demonstration to date is limited by the use of both conventional aluminosilicate host and smaller core diameters. In these cases, higher inversion is required due to the aluminosilicate host and higher pump brightness is required due to the smaller core, which results in high signal brightness for the same output power. These factors lead to large pump power to exit fiber, resulting in poor efficiency. Phosphosilicate host, on the other hand, requires much lower inversions to reach the gain threshold at 1018nm. The combination of phosphosilicate host and large-core leakage channel fibers (LCF) is a perfect candidate for efficient 1018nm fiber laser. We report a highly efficient Yb-doped phosphosilicate LCF laser with a quantum defect of 4.1% using a ~50μm-core diameter and ~420μm cladding diameter. The slope efficiency with respect to the launched pump power at 1018nm is 70%. The ASE suppression is <60dB. The large cladding of 420μm demonstrates a combination of high efficiency, ~4% quantum defect and high-power low-brightness diode pumping. We have also studied the limits of operating ytterbium fiber lasers at shorter wavelengths and found the efficiency to fall off at shorter wavelengths due to the much higher inversions required.

We report the fabrication of extremely low NA preforms (<0.03), highly doped with Yb using a conventional Modified Chemical Vapor Deposition (MCVD) system. Our lowest NA preform (0.025 NA) was drawn to a 52um core step-index double-clad fiber operating in a single mode regime (M²=1.04). The fiber had a mode field diameter (MFD) and an effective area (A_eff) greater than 35um and 1000um² respectively. In a fiber laser configuration, the efficiency was greater than 85% without any sign of photodarkening. To the best of our knowledge, by using our extremely low NA preforms we have demonstrated the largest MFD and A_eff to date for a single-mode step index double–clad Yb doped fiber without involving any micro-structuration.

A cladding-pumped, LMA ErYb fiber-based, amplifier is presented for use in a LIDAR transmitter for remote sensing of atmospheric CO₂ from space. The amplifier is optimized for high peak power, high efficiency, and narrow linewidth operation at 1572.3nm. Using highly reliable COTS components, the amplifier achieves 0.5kW peak power (440uJ pulse energy), 3.3W average power with transform limited (TL) linewidth and M²<1.3. The power amplifier supports a 30% increase in pulse energy when linewidth is increased to 100MHz. A preliminary conductively cooled laser optical module (LOM) concept has size 9x10x1.25 in (113 in³) and estimated weight of 7.2lb (3.2 kg). Energy scaling with pulse width up to 645uJ, 1.5usec is demonstrated. A novel doubleclad ErYb LMA fiber (30/250um) with high pump absorption (6 dB/m at 915nm) was designed, fabricated, and characterized for power scaling. The upgraded power amplifier achieves 0.8kW peak power (720uJ pulse energy) 5.4W average power with TL linewidth and M²<1.5.

We have developed a high power single-mode (SM) monolithic fiber laser at 1018 nm, producing 230 W CW, with an M² of 1.17 and light to light efficiency of 75%. To the best of our knowledge this is the highest power described in the open literature from a SM fiber laser at this wavelength. Careful simulations were employed which take into account the various wavelength dependent parameters such as the fiber absorption and emission as obtained from the fiber manufacturers, and the cavity mirrors’ reflection, in addition to the fiber geometrical parameters. It was found that the major obstacle for increasing the power at 1018nm is the self-generation of amplified spontaneous emission at wavelengths of 1030-1040nm. If the laser is not designed properly these undesired wavelengths dominate the output spectrum.

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.

Here, we present a passive 30-m long enhancement cavity that supports a steady-state enhancement of 198, which is the highest enhancement that has ever been reached in such a long cavity. Furthermore, we demonstrate the extraction of a short burst with a total energy of 53.6 μJ employing an acousto-optic modulator (AOM) as a switching device. The cavity was seeded with pulses of 1.49 μJ energy at 10 MHz repetition rate. The individual output coupled pulses showed an energy enhancement of up to 8.5 while the whole burst contained the entire energy of 36 input pulses. In the last section theoretical considerations for the single pulse extraction are presented and briefly discussed.

We report the generation of 10 μJ, ultrashort 97 fs pulses at 1 MHz by implementing a two-arm spectral coherent combining scheme in a fiber chirped-pulse amplifier (FCPA), allowing both gain-narrowing mitigation and large stretching ratio for energy extraction. Such architecture is able to support the amplification of large-bandwidth (>15 nm) together with high gain factor (>30 dB), allowing the generation of ultrashort sub-100 fs pulses at the output of a FCPA for the first time.

We demonstrate a fiber laser that generates bursts of 70-300 pulses at a frequency of 2-8 MHz with over 4 mJ of energy per burst at a wavelength of 532 nm. The output of an Yb-doped fiber amplifier chain is doubled in a single pass through an LBO crystal with efficiency of above 65%. A seed-diode generates the pulse train, which is amplified to a peak power that allows efficient SHG. Such a solution may have many industrial and other applications, where fiber-based solutions have many advantages, but suffer a disadvantage of relatively low pulse energy.

We demonstrated robust and bend insensitive fiber delivery of high power laser with diffraction limited beam quality for two different kinds of hollow core band gap fibers. The light source for this experiment consists of ytterbium-doped double clad fiber aeroGAIN-ROD-PM85 in a high power amplifier setup. It provided 22ps pulses with a maximum average power of 95W, 40MHz repetition rate at 1032nm (~2.4μJ pulse energy), with M² <1.3. We determined the facet damage threshold for a 7-cells hollow core photonic bandgap fiber and showed up to 59W average power output for a 5 meters fiber. The damage threshold for a 19-cell hollow core photonic bandgap fiber exceeded the maximum power provided by the light source and up to 76W average output power was demonstrated for a 1m fiber. In both cases, no special attention was needed to mitigate bend sensitivity. The fibers were coiled on 8 centimeters radius spools and even lower bending radii were present. In addition, stimulated rotational Raman scattering arising from nitrogen molecules was measured through a 42m long 19 cell hollow core fiber.

Advanced methods in data science are driving the characterization and control of nonlinear dynamical systems in optics. In this work, we investigate the use of machine learning, sparsity methods and adaptive control to develop a self-tuning fiber laser, which automatically learns and adapts to maintain high-energy ultrashort pulses. In particular, a two-stage procedure is introduced consisting of a machine learning algorithm to recognize different dynamical regimes with distinct behavior, followed by an adaptive control algorithm to reject disturbances and track optimal solutions despite stochastically varying system parameters. The machine learning algorithm, called sparse representation for classification, comes from machine vision and is typically used for image recognition. The adaptive control algorithm is extremum-seeking control, which has been applied to a wide range of systems in engineering; extremum-seeking is beneficial because of rigorous stability guarantees and ease of implementation.

We present an all-fiber integrated master oscillator power amplifier operating at 1940 nm. The source delivers 422-nJ chirped pulses at a repetition rate of 10.18 MHz corresponding to 4.3 W of average power. The pulses were recompressed down to 900 fs yielding 220 kW of peak power. Stretching the pulse to 200 ps allows further energy scaling beyond the microjoule barrier at low repetition rate (E_p = 4 μJ at 92 kHz, Δτp =1.6 ps).

We report herein an all-fiber single-frequency master oscillator power amplifier (MOPA) at 1550 nm with Er/Yb-codoped active fiber and wavelength-stabilized 976-nm LD pump source. A pump-limited maximum continuous-wave output power of 56.4 W was achieved under the pump power of 150 W, with corresponding slope efficiency being 37.0%. Via the self-heterodyne method, the evolution of spectrum linewidth during the amplification was investigated for the high-power MOPA-based single-frequency fiber laser. The linewidth and relative intensity noise at the maximum output power are 4.21 kHz and −110 dBm/Hz, respectively.

We experimentally demonstrate a cascaded generation of a conventional dissipative soliton (DS) at 1020 nm and Raman dissipative solitons (RDS) of the first (1065 nm) and second (1115 nm) orders inside a common fiber laser cavity. The generated high-energy pulses are shown to be linearly-chirped and compressible to 200-300 fs durations for all wavelengths. Moreover, the pulses are mutually coherent that has been confirmed by efficient coherent combining exhibiting ~75 fs and <40 fs interference fringes within the combined pulse envelope of a DS with the first-order RDS and the second-order RDS respectively. The numerical simulation was performed with sinusoidal (soft) and step-like (hard) spectral filters and took into account the discreetness of the laser elements. Shown that even higher degree of coherence and shorter pulses could be achieved with hard spectral filtering. This approach opens the door towards cascaded generation of multiple coherent dissipative solitons in a broad spectral range (so-called dissipative soliton comb). The demonstrated source of coherent dissipative solitons can improve numerous areas such as frequency comb generation, pulse synthesis, biomedical imaging and the generation of coherent mid-infrared supercontinuum.

We report on the development of an all-fiber, 68-kW-peak-power, 16-ps-pulse-width, narrow-bandwidth, linearly polarized, 1064-nm fiber laser suitable for high-power, picosecond-pulse-width, green-light generation. Our 1064-nm fiber laser delivered an average power of up to 110 W at a repetition of 100- MHz in a narrow bandwidth, with minimal nonlinear distortion. We developed a high-power, picosecond green source at 532 nm through use of single-pass frequency-doubling of our 1064-nm fiber laser in lithium triborate (LBO). Using a 15-mm long LBO crystal, we have generated 30 W of average power in the second harmonic with 73-W of fundamental average power, for a conversion efficiency of 41%.

CO₂ laser processing facilitates contamination free, rapid, precise and reproducible fabrication of devices for high power fibre laser applications. We present recent progress in fibre end-face preparation and cladding surface modification techniques. We demonstrate a fine feature CO₂ laser process that yields topography significantly smaller than that achieved with typical mechanical cleaving processes. We also investigate the side processing of optical fibres for the fabrication of all-glass cladding light strippers and demonstrate extremely efficient cladding mode removal. We apply both techniques to fibres with complex designs containing multiple layers of doped and un-doped silica as well as shaped and circularly symmetric structures. Finally, we discuss the challenges and approaches to working with various fibre and glass-types.

We report an industrial grade picosecond and femtosecond pulse Yb fiber lasers with >100 μJ pulse energy and hundreds of Watts of average power for improved laser machining speed of sapphire and glass. This highly efficient laser offers >25% wall plug efficiency within a compact 3U rack-mountable configuration plus a long >2m fiber delivery cable. Reconfigurable features such as controllable repetition rate, fine pulse duration control, burst mode operation and adjustable pulse energy permit the customer to tailor the laser to their application.

With the rapid acceptance of fiber lasers and amplifiers for various materials processing and defense applications the long term optical and mechanical reliability of the fiber laser, and therefore the components that make up the laser, is of significant interest to the industrial and defense communities. The double clad fiber used in a fiber laser is a key component whose lifetime in typical deployment conditions needs to be understood. The optical reliability of double clad fiber has recently been studied and a predictive model of fiber lifetime has been published. In contrast, a rigorous model for the mechanical reliability of the fiber and an analysis of the variables affecting the lifetime of the fiber in typical deployment conditions has not been studied. This paper uses the COST-218 model which is widely used for analyzing the mechanical lifetime of fiber used in the telecom industry. The factors affecting lifetime are analyzed to make the reader aware of the design choices a laser manufacturer can make, and the information they must seek from fiber suppliers, to ensure excellent lifetime for double clad fiber and consequently for the fiber laser. It is shown that the fiber’s stress corrosion susceptibility, its proof strength, the coil diameter and the length of fiber coiled to achieve good beam quality all have important implications on fiber lifetime.

We demonstrate a high brightness, polarization maintaining 42+1 to 1 cascaded combiner system which consists of a tree architecture with one 6+1 to 1 pump-signal combiner pumped with six multimode pump combiners. The cascaded combiner system has a pump efficiency of 95%, high beam quality with greater than 20dB PER. In this work the higher brightness of the combiner system is driven by choice of optimized pump fibers and high efficiency of multimode pump combiners that operate at an average pump efficiency of 99%.

Single-mode (SM) kW-class fiber lasers are the tools of choice for material processing applications such as sheet metal cutting and welding. However, application requirements include a flat-top intensity profile and specific beam parameter product (BPP). Here, Nufern introduces a novel specialty fiber technology capable of converting a SM laser beam into a flat-top beam suited for these applications. The performances are demonstrated using a specialty fiber with 100 μm pure silica core, 0.22 NA surrounded by a 120 μm fluorine-doped layer and a 360 μm pure silica cladding, which was designed to match the conventional beam delivery fibers. A SM fiber laser operating at a wavelength of 1.07 μm and terminated with a large-mode area (LMA) fiber with 20 μm core and 0.06 NA was directly coupled in the core of the flat-top specialty fiber using conventional splicing technique. The output beam profile and BPP were characterized first with a low-power source and confirmed using a 2 kW laser and we report a beam transformation from a SM beam into a flat-top intensity profile beam with a 3.8 mm*mrad BPP. This is, to the best of our knowledge, the first successful beam transformation from SM to MM flat-top with controlled BPP in a single fiber integrated in a multi-kW all-fiber system architecture.

A compact 1030nm fiber laser for ultraviolet generation at 257.5nm is presented. The laser employs a short length of highly-doped, large core (20μm), coiled polarization-maintaining ytterbium-doped double-clad fiber pumped by a wavelength-stabilized 975nm diode. It is passively Q-switched via a Cr⁴⁺:YAG saturable absorber and generates 2.4W at 1030nm in a 110μJ pulse train. Lithium triborate (LBO) and beta-barium borate (BBO) are used to achieve 325mW average power at the fourth harmonic. The laser's small form factor, narrow linewidth and modest power consumption are suitable for use in a man-portable ultraviolet Raman explosives detection system.

We present results from an all-fibre thulium laser system that can be tuned to any wavelength between 1710 – 2110 nm, without using any moving mechanical parts. An Acousto-Optic Tunable Filter (AOTF) is used as the tuning element, which allows for the wavelength to be tuned in ~ 20 μs. Core-pumped and cladding pumped thulium fibres are used to enable lasing action across the wavelength range. We use in-house fabricated fused fibre couplers and combiners that have a flattened coupling response with wavelength to allow for the system to be built in an all fibre design. These couplers have a coupling response that only varies by +/- 10% over the 400 nm operating range. The laser can output powers between 1-5 mW over 1710 – 2110 nm and has a linewidth of <0.2 nm. An Acousto-optic modulator is used as a switch on the output of the laser to switch the signal between core-pumped and cladding-pumped amplifier stages. This allows for the output signals to be amplified to ~1W levels.

A novel single-mode large-mode-area (LMA) optical fiber is proposed. The primary part of the cladding is a thin layer with high refractive index. The layer possesses a periodic array of holes (or intrusions) which are either drawn in the propagation direction or drilled in the radial direction. When the holes (or intrusions) are drawn in the propagation direction, the periodicity of their array is in the azimuthal direction. The core may be hollow. The light confinement is achieved via a transmission anti-resonance. Namely, the array of holes allows coupling between an optical mode inside the primary cladding layer and the light both in the core and in the outer space. The light then sees two channels to penetrate the cladding: direct transmission and holes-assisted transmission. A distractive interference between these channels is achieved at an appropriate combination of fiber parameters. The fiber can be designed to hold nearly anyone of TE/TM_nm modes. Computer simulations of the fiber were performed using COMSOL. The open boundary was simulated using a perfectly matched layer and the attenuation constants of different modes were determined via the imaginary parts of their propagation constants. As an example, a fiber holding a single TE₀₁ mode inside a core of 100 μm diameter for the vacuum wavelength 1.55 μm was designed. The attenuation constant of the TE₀₁ mode was found to be 5.8 ⋅ 10⁻⁶ [dB/cm] while the other modes had attenuation of at least 4 orders of magnitude larger. Required fabrication tolerances were calculated and the fabrication of fibers of lengths 10 – 1000 m was found to be feasible. The bandwidth of the fiber was found to be in the range of 5 – 35 nm, depending on its length. Possible applications include high-power CW and pulsed lasers and amplifiers, sensors and others.

We report detailed characterization results of Yb-doped Chirally-Coupled-Core (3C) fibers fabricated with Direct Nanoparticle Deposition (DND) technique. Two types of 3C fibers with core/clad geometries of 34/250μm and 55/400μm and another 25/250μm conventional large-mode-area (LMA) fiber are measured and the results are compared in terms of modal content, transmission spectrum, etc. A picosecond fiber amplifier is built based on 55/400μm 3C fiber, showing robust single-mode operation with peak power >1MW with no sign of stimulated Raman scattering (SRS).