A 98 W 1178 nm Yb-doped solid-core photonic bandgap fiber oscillator

Abstract

A high-power ytterbium-doped solid-core photonic bandgap fiber laser directly oscillating at 1178 nm is reported. The sharp-cut bandpass distributed filtering effect of photonic bandgap fiber can suppress amplified spontaneous emission (ASE) in the conventional high-gain spectral region. The oscillator is composed of a high reflection fiber Bragg grating spliced with a 39 m gain fiber and a Fresnel fiber end surface. A model based on rate equations is investigated numerically. A record output power of 98 W is achieved with a slope efficiency of 54%. The laser linewidth is 0.5 nm. The spectrum at 98 W indicates that ASE and parasitic lasing are suppressed effectively.