D.C. Hanna

Ytterbium-doped fiber amplifiers

The ytterbium-doped fiber amplifier offers a number of attractive features, including a broad-gain bandwidth and a high efficiency, due in large part to its freedom from various competing processes seen in other rare-earth dopants. Here we discuss the main features that influence design and possible applications of ytterbium-doped fiber amplifiers.

Two-mirror beam-shaping technique for high-power diode bars

A simple beam-shaping technique is described whereby the output from a highly asymmetric non-diffractionlimited laser source, such as a high-power diode bar, can be reconfigured with nearly equal beam-quality factors in orthogonal planes and without a significant reduction in brightness. Using this technique, in conjunction with conventional lenses, we have focused the output from a 20-W cw diode bar to a very intense, nearly circular spot with a 1/e(2) beam diameter of ~100 microm and a far-field beam divergence (half-angle) of ~0.2 rad.

A simple beam expander for frequency narrowing of dye lasers

Design considerations and performance of a prism beam expander are presented. Using a prism beam expander and holographic grating, a dye laser pumped by a nitrogen laser has given 15 kW of diffraction limited power in 0.1–0.2 cm−1 linewidth. Addition of a single etalon gave a single frequency output of 10 kW in a linewidth of less than 0.01 cm−1.

High-power cladding pumped Tm-doped silica fiber laser with wavelength tuning from 1860 to 2090 nm

A high-power double-clad Tm-doped silica fiber laser, pumped by two beam-shaped and polarization-coupled diode bars at 787 nm, was wavelength tuned by use of an external cavity containing a diffraction grating. The Tm fiber laser produced a maximum output power of 7 W at 1940 nm for 40 W of incident diode power and was tuned over a wavelength range of 230 nm from 1860 to 2090 nm, with >5-W output power over the range 1870-2040 nm. The prospects for further improvement in performance and extension of the tuning range are discussed.

Energy-transfer upconversion and thermal lensing in high-power end-pumped Nd:YLF laser crystals

Thermal lensing in an end-pumped Nd:LiYF/sub 4/ rod, under lasing and nonlasing conditions, has been investigated. Under lasing conditions, a weak thermal lens, with dioptric power varying linearly with pump power, was observed. Under nonlasing conditions, where higher inversion densities were involved, hence relevant to Q-switched operation or operation as an amplifier, a much stronger thermal lens was measured, whose power increased nonlinearly with pump power. This difference has been attributed to the increased heat deposition due to the subsequent multiphonon decay following various interionic upconversion processes, which increase strongly under nonlasing conditions, and is further exacerbated by the unfavorable temperature dependencies of heat conductivity and the rate of change of the refractive index with temperature. A strategy for reducing upconversion and its associated thermal loading, without degrading laser performance, is discussed.

Ring-doped cladding-pumped single-mode three-level fiber laser

We propose and theoretically analyze three-level cladding-pumped fiber lasers in which the laser-active dopant is placed in a ring around a single-mode core. A ring-doped laser can work efficiently at wavelengths with strong small-signal absorption. This is otherwise difficult in a cladding-pumped fiber. Moreover, ring doping makes the laser less sensitive to quenching of the laser-active dopant and to excited-state absorption of the lasing field. In simulations of a Yb(3+) -doped fiber laser, ring doping increased the slope efficiency to 62%, up from 13% for a conventional core-doped fiber.

High-inversion densities in Nd:YAG-upconversion and bleaching

We report on the investigation of upconversion in Nd:YAG and its implications for intensely pumped devices. Analysis of lifetime measurements and the performance of a 1 at.% Nd-doped YAG amplifier give an Auger upconversion rate of 7/spl times/10/sup 3/ s/sup -1/. This is significantly smaller than previously reported, but modeling of the performance of Nd:YAG devices with high-inversion densities shows that even this rate can still seriously degrade the small-signal gain and significantly increase the thermal load. The variation of cross-relaxation and upconversion rates with doping level is also described. Finally, it is found that the effect of bleaching of the Nd:YAG absorption can lead to a reduced spatial overlap between the signal and inversion profiles and thus can also significantly reduce the gain.

Telescopic resonators for large-volume TEM00-mode operation

A stable resonator incorporating a suitably adjusted telescope gives reliable operation of an Nd:YAG laser with a large-volume TEM00 mode. The telescope adjustment is chosen to minimize the effect of focal length variations in the laser rod and at the same time ensures the optimum mode-selection properties of a confocal resonator. Simple approximations applied to the ray transfer matrices allow a detailed analysis of the resonator to be performed. This analysis yields simple design equations relating the mode spot sizes, resonator length, telescope magnification and defocusing, and diffraction losses. Experimental results show excellent agreement with the results of this analysis.

Generation of high-power blue light in periodically poled LiNbO3

We report the generation of 450-mW average blue (473-nm) power by frequency doubling of a diode-pumped 946-nm Nd:YAG laser. We achieved pulsed operation at a high repetition rate (~160kHz) by driving the relaxation oscillations of the laser. A 40% conversion efficiency to the second harmonic was obtained in a single-pass, extracavity, first-order, quasi-phase-matched process in which periodically poled lithium niobate (period 4.5microm , thickness 0.5mm , and length 15mm) at 140 degrees C was used. The resulting high-power blue beam was circular in profile and nearly diffraction limited, indicating that photorefractive effects do not appear to limit device performance.

Frequency upconversion in Tm- and Yb:Tm-doped silica fibers

Frequency upconversion has been observed and studied in Tm3+-doped and Yb3+-sensitized Tm3+-doped silica fibers. In the singly singly doped fiber upconversion to the blue and UV has been observed under excitation in the red (660 nm) and infra-red (1.064µm). In the co-doped fiber upconversion has also been observed under excitation at around 800-900 nm.