Diode-pumped femtosecond solid state lasers based on semiconductor saturable absorbers

Daniel Kopf; Th. Straessle; Guang Jun Zhang; Franz X. Kaertner; Ursula Keller; Michael Moser; D. Jubin; Kurt J. Weingarten; Raymond J. Beach; Mark A. Emanuel; Jay A. Skidmore

doi:10.1117/12.239711

8 May 1996 Diode-pumped femtosecond solid state lasers based on semiconductor saturable absorbers

Daniel Kopf, Th. Straessle, Guang Jun Zhang, Franz X. Kaertner, Ursula Keller, Michael Moser, D. Jubin, Kurt J. Weingarten, Raymond J. Beach, Mark A. Emanuel, Jay A. Skidmore

Author Affiliations +

Proceedings Volume 2701, Generation, Amplification, and Measurement of Ultrashort Laser Pulses III; (1996) https://doi.org/10.1117/12.239711
Event: Photonics West '96, 1996, San Jose, CA, United States

Abstract

`Real-world' applications of femtosecond pulses require laser sources that are reliable, compact, and easy-to-use. Diode-pumped lasers are one key step in this direction, and as a next key step we have developed and demonstrated a simple technique using semiconductor saturable absorbers to passively start and stabilize mode-locked lasers. Because the saturable absorber stabilizes soliton modelocking, we achieve self-starting modelocking over a wide cavity stability range, in contrast to KLM, which tends to require critical cavity alignment and is usually not self-starting. We discuss different saturable absorber designs. An A-FPSA is used in a diode-pumped Nd:glass laser (130 fs, 100 mW avg output power) and a Cr:LiSAF laser (45 fs, 80 mW output). A thin saturable absorber design provides self-starting mode- locking over a wavelength range of 30 nm, and a low-loss design supports a record mode- locked output power of 120 mW from a Cr:LiSAF laser. A dispersive saturable absorber mirror design combines both negative dispersion compensation and saturable absorption within one semiconductor device and produces a compact mode-locked Cr:LiSAF laser (160 fs, 25 mW) without the need of prisms for dispersion compensation. Finally, we present an optimized diode-pumped cavity layout for Cr:LiSAF which allows for higher output powers (> 1 W cw).

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Daniel Kopf, Th. Straessle, Guang Jun Zhang, Franz X. Kaertner, Ursula Keller, Michael Moser, D. Jubin, Kurt J. Weingarten, Raymond J. Beach, Mark A. Emanuel, and Jay A. Skidmore "Diode-pumped femtosecond solid state lasers based on semiconductor saturable absorbers", Proc. SPIE 2701, Generation, Amplification, and Measurement of Ultrashort Laser Pulses III, (8 May 1996); https://doi.org/10.1117/12.239711

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