High power short pulse fiber laser
First Claim
1. A pulsed fiber laser comprising:
- a modelocked fiber oscillator comprising a gain fiber and a pair of reflective optical elements disposed with respect to said gain fiber to form a resonant cavity, said modelocked fiber oscillator comprising a semiconductor saturable absorber (SAM) optically connected and in close contact with an end of said gain fiber and operably arranged to induce modelocking, said modelocked fiber oscillator producing a train of optical pulses having an average pulse width, said modelocked fiber oscillator comprising a wedge-shaped area between said SAM and said end of said gain fiber, wherein said wedge-shaped area is operably arranged to limit the finesse of an etalon formed with surfaces of said SAM and said gain fiber;
a fiber amplifier optically connected to said modelocked fiber oscillator such that said optical pulses can propagate through said amplifier, said fiber amplifier amplifying said optical pulses; and
one or more optical pump sources optically connected to said modelocked fiber oscillator and said fiber amplifier to pump said fiber oscillator and fiber amplifier.
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Accused Products
Abstract
A pulsed laser comprises an oscillator and amplifier. An attenuator and/or pre-compressor may be disposed between the oscillator and amplifier to improve performance and possibly the quality of pulses output from the laser. Such pre-compression may be implemented with spectral filters and/or dispersive elements between the oscillator and amplifier. The pulsed laser may have a modular design comprising modular devices that may have Telcordia-graded quality and reliability. Fiber pigtails extending from the device modules can be spliced together to form laser system. In one embodiment, a laser system operating at approximately 1050 nm comprises an oscillator having a spectral bandwidth of approximately 19 nm. This oscillator signal can be manipulated to generate a pulse having a width below approximately 90 fs. A modelocked linear fiber laser cavity with enhanced pulse-width control includes concatenated sections of both polarization-maintaining and non-polarization-maintaining fibers. Apodized fiber Bragg gratings and integrated fiber polarizers are included in the cavity to assist in linearly polarizing the output of the cavity. Very short pulses with a large optical bandwidth are obtained by matching the dispersion value of the fiber Bragg grating to the inverse of the dispersion of the intra-cavity fiber.
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Citations
23 Claims
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1. A pulsed fiber laser comprising:
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a modelocked fiber oscillator comprising a gain fiber and a pair of reflective optical elements disposed with respect to said gain fiber to form a resonant cavity, said modelocked fiber oscillator comprising a semiconductor saturable absorber (SAM) optically connected and in close contact with an end of said gain fiber and operably arranged to induce modelocking, said modelocked fiber oscillator producing a train of optical pulses having an average pulse width, said modelocked fiber oscillator comprising a wedge-shaped area between said SAM and said end of said gain fiber, wherein said wedge-shaped area is operably arranged to limit the finesse of an etalon formed with surfaces of said SAM and said gain fiber; a fiber amplifier optically connected to said modelocked fiber oscillator such that said optical pulses can propagate through said amplifier, said fiber amplifier amplifying said optical pulses; and one or more optical pump sources optically connected to said modelocked fiber oscillator and said fiber amplifier to pump said fiber oscillator and fiber amplifier. - View Dependent Claims (2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9)
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10. A Yb-based pulsed fiber laser amplification system comprising:
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a Yb passively modelocked fiber oscillator configured to output optical pulses, said Yb passively modelocked fiber oscillator comprising a saturable absorber, and an oscillator pump configured to optically pump said Yb passively modelocked fiber oscillator, wherein said saturable absorber exhibits a multi-temporal lifetime and is configured such that Q-switched mode-locking evolves at a low oscillator pump power followed by cw mode locking at a higher operational pump power that exceeds a threshold pump power for operation of said mode locked laser; a fiber Bragg grating configured to control intra-cavity dispersion and configured as a mirror of said Yb passively modelocked fiber oscillator; a fiber amplifier optically connected to said modelocked fiber oscillator via a first optical path, said fiber amplifier configured to amplify said optical pulses; and an optical pump source optically connected to said fiber amplifier. - View Dependent Claims (11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20)
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21. A pulsed fiber laser comprising:
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a modelocked fiber oscillator comprising a gain fiber and a pair of reflective optical elements disposed with respect to said gain fiber to form a resonant cavity, said modelocked fiber oscillator comprising a semiconductor saturable absorber (SAM) optically connected to said gain fiber and arranged such that said modelocked fiber oscillator comprises a wedge-shaped area between said SAM and said gain fiber, wherein said wedge-shaped area is operably arranged to limit the finesse of an etalon formed with surfaces of said SAM and said fiber, said modelocked fiber oscillator producing a train of optical pulses having an average pulse width; a fiber amplifier optically connected to said modelocked fiber oscillator such that said optical pulses can propagate through said amplifier, said fiber amplifier amplifying said optical pulses; and one or more optical pump sources optically connected to said modelocked fiber oscillator and said fiber amplifier to pump said fiber oscillator and fiber amplifier. - View Dependent Claims (22, 23)
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Specification