A mechanical-free 150-kHz repetition swept light source incorporated a KTN electro-optic deflector

Shogo Yagi; Kazunori Naganuma; Tadayuki Imai; Yasuo Shibata; Shigeo Ishibashi; Yuzo Sasaki; Masahiro Sasaura; Kazuo Fujiura; Kazutoshi Kato

doi:10.1117/12.876024

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11 February 2011 A mechanical-free 150-kHz repetition swept light source incorporated a KTN electro-optic deflector

Shogo Yagi, Kazunori Naganuma, Tadayuki Imai, Yasuo Shibata, Shigeo Ishibashi, Yuzo Sasaki, Masahiro Sasaura, Kazuo Fujiura, Kazutoshi Kato

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Proceedings Volume 7889, Optical Coherence Tomography and Coherence Domain Optical Methods in Biomedicine XV; 78891J (2011) https://doi.org/10.1117/12.876024
Event: SPIE BiOS, 2011, San Francisco, California, United States

Abstract

We present a new light source for the swept-source OCT, that is, an external-cavity LD incorporating an electro-optic deflector. We use a KTN deflector that is unique in being very fast and simultaneously providing an appreciable deflection caused by injected carriers. Particularly, high-speed and nearly linear to the applied voltage operation is attained when KTN crystal is pre-charged. Our 1.3-μm Littman-Metcalf external-cavity laser exhibits static linewidth < 0.1 nm, and a 110-nm scanning range up to 150-kHz under a ±200 V sinusoidal driving voltage to the deflector. Being free of mechanical resonance, the laser would hopefully realize a faster (in a separate study, deflector itself worked up to 400 kHz) and wavenumber-linear scan that is ideal for the swept-source OCT by designing the waveform of driving voltage. And as for the resolving power of deflector, while our KTN deflector has only 35 spatial resolvable points, the number of wavelength points for the swept source clearly exceeds to this limit, which we attribute to line narrowing effect accompanied by the laser operation. Preliminary OCT images taken using the swept source are also presented.

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Shogo Yagi, Kazunori Naganuma, Tadayuki Imai, Yasuo Shibata, Shigeo Ishibashi, Yuzo Sasaki, Masahiro Sasaura, Kazuo Fujiura, and Kazutoshi Kato "A mechanical-free 150-kHz repetition swept light source incorporated a KTN electro-optic deflector", Proc. SPIE 7889, Optical Coherence Tomography and Coherence Domain Optical Methods in Biomedicine XV, 78891J (11 February 2011); https://doi.org/10.1117/12.876024

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