The amazing progress of high-power ultrafast thin-disk lasers

Abstract

Ultrafast lasers continue to be at the forefront of many scientific breakthroughs and technological achievements and progress in the performance of these systems continue to open doors in many new and exciting interdisciplinary fields. In particular, in the last decade, the average power of ultrafast lasers has seen a significant increase, opening up exciting new perspectives. Among the different technologies that have shaped these advances, thin-disk lasers have generated particularly spectacular breakthroughs. We review here the latest state-of-the-art of the technology and highlight new application fields of these cutting-edge laser systems.

Multioctave supercontinuum generation and frequency conversion based on rotational nonlinearity

“…Accordingly, for a given molecular gas, there exists a range of pulse durations that can provide either symmetric or red-shifted spectral broadening. We therefore identify propagation in molecular gases as an efficient platform for both the compression of long laser pulses, potentially yielding few-cycle pulses directly from industrial-grade picosecond lasers ( 34 ), and the generation of high-energy, long-wavelength femtosecond pulses in hollow-core fibers (see the Supplementary Materials) ( 35 ). Optimistically, the use of larger linear molecules with substantially larger electronic and rotational nonlinearities and longer rotational periods ( 36 ) could potentially allow nonlinear compression of pulses with durations greater than 10 ps, which can be generated via direct amplification.…”

The laser lightning rod project

“…Yb-doped laser crystals have emerged as the material of choice for high-average-power applications since the 30501-p2 advent of very powerful and brilliant InGaAs pump laser diodes [39], providing kilowatts of optical power around the main absorption band of Yb-doped crystals at 940 nm. Exceptionally low heat is generated owing to the small quantum defect (∼ 9%), while their long fluorescence lifetime (∼ 0.9 ms) and excellent thermal conductivity allow for cw pumping and operation at very high average power levels [40].…”

“…Exceptionally low heat is generated owing to the small quantum defect (∼ 9%), while their long fluorescence lifetime (∼ 0.9 ms) and excellent thermal conductivity allow for cw pumping and operation at very high average power levels [40]. The thin-disk geometry has been established as one of the most successful candidates for high-power scaling, providing multikilowatt laser output power [39]. Invented in 1993 by Adolf Giesen [41], the technology has been matured and industrialized by TRUMPF Laser GmbH over more than two decades, focusing on industrial applications.…”

Ultrafast thin-disk multipass amplifier with 720 mJ operating at kilohertz repetition rate for applications in atmospheric research

“…In contrast, kilowatt average power levels are routinely achieved with Yb-based diode-pumped ultrafast laser systems. Their architecture can be based on slab [23,24], fiber [25,26] or thin-disk geometries [27]. Pulse energy scaling has been particularly successful in thin-disk based regenerative amplifiers.…”