Abstract

Supercontinuum generation in the long pulse pumping regime is characterized by important pulse-to-pulse energy fluctuations resulting from the noise sensitivity of the initial modulation instability process [1]. This prevents the use of such sources in many dynamical imaging applications, such as fluorescence lifetime imaging microscopy (FLIM). We show here that a passive method based on the use of tapered fibers can drastically reduce those fluctuations, particularly in the visible domain of interest for microscopy.

© 2011 Optical Society of America