Characterization of a supercontinuum source for high-repetition-rate nonlinear spectroscopies

Abstract

Ultrafast fiber lasers represent an affordable source for performing non-linear spectroscopies, like transient absorption or coherent antistokes Raman scattering, and can advance these technologies towards commercial devices. We experimentally investigate the generation of white light in photonic crystal fibers at low pulse energies and high repetition rates using 775 nm pulses at 80 MHz from the second harmonic of an Er:fiber laser. Two different fibers were chosen based on non-linear beam-propagation simulations. The generated broadband light was characterized and compared in terms of spectral bandwidth, pulse duration and shot-to shot noise, showing good agreement with the simulations.