High-Power Ultraflat Near-Infrared Supercontinuum Generation Pumped by a Continuous Amplified Spontaneous Emission Source

Abstract

A high-power ultraflat near-infrared supercontinuum (SC) is generated in a section of photonic crystal fiber (PCF) pumped by an amplified spontaneous emission (ASE) source instead of continuous-wave (CW) and pulsed lasers. A low-power ASE seed at 1 m is amplified to be 90.9 W by two fiber amplifiers and then emitted from a 10-m-core fiber. Using this ASE source to pump a section of 100-m-long PCF, a 49.5-W near-infrared SC is obtained, and the 5-dB spectral bandwidth is 760 nm, covering from 1062 to 1822 nm. This is the reported highest power of ASE-pumped SC source. A comparative experiment is taken with a 122-W CW laser at 1090 nm to pump the same PCF. A 56.2-W SC source is generated with 5-dB spectral width of 605 nm from 1082 to 1687 nm. The conversion efficiency to SC is higher, and the spectrum is broader and flatter using the ASE source as the pump. Conclusively, pump incoherence can aid the SC generation and spectral flatness.

ASE narrow-band noise pulsing in erbium-doped fiber amplifier and its effect on self-phase modulation

“…Such kind of light sources are successful in many applications, including high-precision fiber-optic gyroscopes [1,2], low-coherence interferometry [3], optical coherence tomography [4,5], etc. Recently, it was demonstrated that nanosecond ASE pulses produced by actively Q-switched fiber lasers may provide an effective pump for supercontinuum generation [6][7][8][9]. ASE sources may also serve as seed for CW amplifying to a multi-hundred watts level with inherently suppressed SBS because of the broad ASE spectrum [10][11][12].…”

In-band pumping avenue based high power superfluorescent fiber source with record power and near-diffraction-limited beam quality

“…Especially, the utilizations of high power SFSs in many fields, such as mid-infrared laser and supercontinuum generation [10,11] , random fiber laser, and Raman fiber laser pumping [12][13][14] and spectral beam combination [15] , have been demonstrated in recent years for its inherent unique incoherence and high temporal stability characteristics. Consequently, the performance scalability of high power SFS is extremely significant.…”

Studies of central wavelength of high-power all-fiber superfluorescent sources with Yb-doped double-clad fibers

“…Xu et al achieved 1.01 kW ASE output with a three-stage allfiberized master oscillator power amplifier structure; the central wavelength was 1074.4 nm and the FWHM line width was 8.15 nm [8]. Jin et al used a 90.9 W ASE seed ranging from 1049 nm to 1072 nm as the pumping source of a high-power, ultraflat, nearinfrared, supercontinuum source [9]. In addition to Yb-doped fibers, Tm-doped fibers can also be used to design high-power SFSs [10][11][12].…”