Abstract

The passively mode-locked continuous-wave dye laser has provided the source of the temporally shortest pulses since its inception in 1972(1). However, over the past fourteen years only a single combination of active/passive dye has been used, namely that of Rhodamine 6G and DODCI, consequently limiting the spectral extent of the system to ~ 610 - 640 nm. With optimised and dispersion compensated cavities being capable of producing pulses as short as 27fs(2), additional passively mode-locked cw dye lasers present an attractive and simple alternative to conţinuum generation (3) or external pulse compression of synchronously pumped dye lasers (4) as the source of frequency tunable femtosecond pulses.

© 1986 Optical Society of America