Abstract
We present the first practical optical limiter for ultrashort, ~ 100-fs, laser pulses. Optical limiters show decreased transmittance with increasing laser pulse energy so that the transmitted energy is kept small.1 These devices are characterized by the onset-of-limiting energy Eon (pulse energy at which the transmittance T has fallen to Tlin/2,Tlin transmittance in the linear regime), the “dynamic range” = ED/Eon (ED damage energy), and the maximum transmitted output energy Emax. A practical device for the protection of the human eye or sensitive photodetectors combines a low Eon with a high dynamic range, small Emax, and a large linear transmittance. With our concept, a low threshold Eon = 11 nJ, a large dynamic range of 10750, and sufficient linear transmittance Tlin = 28% are obtained. Moreover, the transmitted energy Emax is restricted to 1.3 μJ.
© 2002 Optical Society of America
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