Abstract
As an important step toward the realization of compact, optical fiber-based, femtosecond pulse systems of the highest possible energies, we demonstrate chirped pulse amplification (CPA) of ultrashort pulses using rare-earth doped fiber amplifiers for the first time. The technique of CPA [1] is well established to produce the highest energy ultrashort pulses in bulk systems. Rare-earth doped fibers are attractive as amplifiers due to the broad bandwidth available in glass hosts. This property has already been exploited in rare-earth doped fiber lasers which have produced pulses as short as 42 fs with Nd-doped fiber [2] and 77 fs with Er-doped fiber [3]. Thus, these fibers can support sub-100 fs pulses. Here, Nd-doped fiber is used to amplify 1.06 µm seed pulses and Er-doped fiber is used to amplify 1.55µm seed pulses in initial experiments toward reaching the saturation energy of several micro-Joules [4] attainable in rare-earth doped fiber amplifiers.
© 1994 Optical Society of America
PDF ArticleMore Like This
A. Galvanauskas, M. E. Fermann, and D. Harter
WC.30 International Conference on Ultrafast Phenomena (UP) 1994
D.V. Korobkin, I.Yu. Khrushchev, A.B. Grudinin, and E.M. Dianov
MF6 Nonlinear Guided-Wave Phenomena (NP) 1991
M. L. Stockt, A. Galvanauskas, M. E. Fermann, G. Mourou, and D. J. Harter
UP6 Advanced Solid State Lasers (ASSL) 1994