The optical biaxial nature of crystals in the potassium titanyl phosphate (KTP) family result in anisotropic transmission that depends on the polarization direction of the transmitted radiation with respect to the fundamental crystal axes. Knowledge of the polarization-dependent crystal transmission is important for all wavelength-conversion applications and in particular is the only limitation on possible combinations of wavelengths when one uses the quasi-phase-matching techniques recently developed for the KTP family materials. In this study, polarized transmission spectra of KTiOPO(4) (KTP), RbTiOPO(4), RbTiOAsO(4) (RTA), and KTiOAsO(4) were measured over the 0.3-6-mum wavelength range with a spectrophotometer and a Fourier-transform infrared spectrometer. Seven crystal samples were studied, including four samples of KTP crystals of different origins. Variations in spectral transmission on the short- and long-wavelength edges, as well as visible-wavelength transmission and OH(-) absorption properties, are presented and discussed. The transmission of one sample of KTP and of RTA was also measured before and after periodic electric field poling.

We show that the photodarkening resistivity of ytterbium-doped fiber lasers can be greatly improved by cerium codoping. It is suggested that the coexistence of the redox couple Ce(3+)/Ce(4+) in the glass provides means for trapping both hole- and electron-related color centers that are responsible for the induced optical losses in Yb-doped fiber lasers.

A method to periodically pole conductive ferroelectric materials has been developed. With this method we have fabricated high quality domain inverted crystals of flux grown KTiOPO4 suitable for efficient quasi-phase matched frequency conversion. Samples have been evaluated by second harmonic generation and normalized conversion efficiencies up to 6.9%/W cm2 have been obtained.

We use two perpendicular crystals of periodically-poled KTP to directly generate polarization-entangled photon pairs, the majority of which are emitted into a single Gaussian spatial mode. The signal and idler photons have wavelengths of 810 nm and 1550 nm, respectively, and the photon-pair generation rate is 1.2x107 sec-1 for a pump power of 62 mW. The apparatus is compact, flexible, and easily to use.

Flow cytometry is currently the gold standard for analysis of cells in the medical laboratory and biomedical research. Fuelled by the need of point-of-care diagnosis, a significant effort has been made to miniaturize and reduce cost of flow cytometers. However, despite recent advances, current microsystems remain less versatile and much slower than their large-scale counterparts. In this work, an all-silica fibre microflow cytometer is presented that measures fluorescence and scattering from particles and cells. It integrates cell transport in circular capillaries and light delivery by optical fibres. Single-stream cell focusing is performed by Elasto-inertial microfluidics to guarantee accurate and sensitive detection. The capability of this technique is extended to high flow rates (up to 800 µl/min), enabling a throughput of 2500 particles/s. The robust, portable and low-cost system described here could be the basis for a point-of-care flow cytometer with a performance comparable to commercial systems.