Study of an actively Q-switch erbium-doped fiber laser in symmetric configuration

Abstract

In this paper, we present the results of theoretical and experimental study of the actively Q-switched erbium-doped fiber laser realized in symmetric configuration. We extend the traveling wave model to this type of fiber lasers and show that such laser permits one to obtain easily the short giant pulses (17 ns on 3 dB level) with small adjacent subpulses. Our model accounts all point losses including loss on the fiber splices and other intra-cavity devices and also the distributed losses such as the active fiber background loss and loss owing to excited state absorption observed in erbium-doped fibers. We compare the experimental data with the modeling results and reveal their good matching, once the laser parameters are properly accounted in the model.