Cladding-Pumped Tm^3＋-Doped Large-Mode-Area Fibre Laser Highly Efficient Output at Approximately 2μm

A cladding-pumped Tm^3＋-doped fibre laser is carried out to generate continuous-wave output power up to 8.4 W at approximately 2 μm with a slope efficiency of 57% compared to the launched pump power. When the fibre is cooled by water, the slope efficiency increases greatly and the output laser spectrum has a blue shift.     

Lasing Characteristics of Tm^3＋：Ho^3＋ Codoped Silica Fibre Laser Pumped by 1.18-μm Raman Fibre Laser

The fundamental characteristics of Fabry-Perot-cavity continuous-wave Tm-Ho codoped silica fibre lasers pumped by a 1.18μm Raman fibre laser are presented. A maximum output power of 930mW at 1880nm is generated for a fibre length of 1 m from the transition of Tm^3 , with a slope efficiency of 32.4%. For a 3-m-long fibre, the maximum output power decreases to 650 mW at 1960 nm due to the laser emission from Ho^3 with a lower slope efficiency of 25%, which clearly shows the effective energy transfer from Tm^3 to Ho^3 . The wavelength redshifting of the laser emission originates from the transition competition and the emission cross section difference between Tm^3 and Ho^3 .     

A Diode-Pumped 1617 nm Single Longitudinal Mode Er：YAG Laser with Intra-Cavity Etalons

We demonstrate the continuous wave p-polarized single longitudinal mode （SLM） operation of an Er：YAG laser at 1617.6nm pumped by a diode-laser with three inserted Fabry-Perot （FP） etalons at room temperature. The Brewster angle inserted FP is applied to obtain the p-polarized laser. For free running, the maximum output power is 570 m W with a pump power of 12.5 W. An incident pump power of 12.5 W is used to generate the maximum p-polarized single longitudinal mode output power of 78.5 m W, corresponding to a slope efficiency of 1.6% and an optical-to-optical efficiency of 0.61%. The beam quality M2 is measured to be 1.15 at the highest SLM output power. This stable polarized SLM oscillation is encouraging due to its application for an injection-locked system used as a master laser.     

A 980 nm Yb-doped single-mode fibre laser with 946 nm Nd:YAG laser as pump source

Based on rate equations,this paper gives expressions of the output power,the pump power threshold,the slope efficiency,the fibre optimal length and the laser gain of a quasi-three-level Yb-doped fibre laser.The gain relationship between quasi-three-level system and four-level system is also given,which provides a theoretical basis for suppressing the four-level transmissions.In the experiment,we adopt the backward pumping configuration and use a linear cavity.The Yb-doped fibre laser has an output power of 372 mW of single-mode laser emission at 980 nm with a slope efficiency of 21.2% when the fibre length is 29.5 cm close to an optimal fibre length in theory.The experimental results accord well with the theoretical analyses.     

A single-longitudinal-mode continuous-wave Ho~(3+):YVO_4 laser at 2.05 μm pumped by a Tm-fibre laser

We present a single-longitudinal-mode continuous-wave Ho~(3+):YVO_4 laser at 2.05 μm pumped by a Tm-doped fibre laser. Use of a cavity etalon enables spectral selectivity for single-mode operation. The highest power achieved in the single longitudinal mode at 2052.5 nm is 282 mW at a slope efficiency of 6.9%, corresponding to an optical conversion efficiency of 3.0%. These features demonstrate that this single-longitudinal-mode Ho:YVO_4 laser is suitable for use as a seed laser in some Lidar systems(e.g., coherent Lidar or differential absorption Lidar). To the best of our knowledge, this is the first report on such a single-longitudinal-mode Ho:YVO_4 laser at 2.05 μm.     

Compact, Low Threshold Nd^3＋：YVO4 Self-Raman Laser at 1178 nm

A compact low-threshold Raman laser at 1178 nm is experimentally realized by using a diode-end-pumped actively Q-switched Nd^3＋ ：YVO4 self-Raman laser. The threshold is 370mW at a pulse repetition frequency of S kHz. The maximum Raman laser output is 182 m W with the pulse duration smaller than 20 ns at a pulse repetition frequency of 30kHz with 1.8 W incident power. The optical efficiency from the incident power to the Raman laser is 10% and the slope efficiency is 13.5%.     

Linear Cavity Erbium—Doped Fibre Laser with Tunable Wavelength Range of 112nm

We report on a linear cavity erbium-doped fibre laser with a large tuning range of 1509-1621nm.We obtain a 1dB flat tuning range of 1538-1613 nm and a 3dB tuning range of 1516-1621 nm.The threshold at 1580 nm is 6.1mW,the slope efficiency is 0.193 and the output power is 18.2mW,when 100mW pump power at 1480nm is provided.High signal-to-noise ratios of better than 60 dB are achieved within all the tuning ranges.     

A Single-Longitudinal-Mode Dual-Wavelength cw Tm,Ho:GdVO4 Microchip Laser

A liquid nitrogen cooled dual-wavelength Tm,Ho：GdVO4 microchip laser is reported. The output dual wavelengths axe at 2038.9nm and 2050.1 nm. At each wavelength, the laser has a single longitudinal mode. The threshold power is nearly 20mW and the slope efficiency is 18.7%. The single longitudinal mode output power reaches 98mW, and the ratio of power is about 60% （2038.9nm） and 40% （2050.1 nm）.     

Ld-Clad-Pumped All-Fiber Tm^3＋-Doped Silica Fiber Laser

The CW 39.4 W all-fiber LD-clad-pumped Tm^3＋-doped fiber laser output is reported with a slope efficiency of 34% in respect to the pump power. The all-fiber laser is made up by progressively splicing the pigtail fiber, matched FBG fiber and Tin-doped fiber. The reflective FBG and Tm-doped fiber end fresnel reflection build up the laser resonance cavity. Due to the multi-mode FBG as the reflective mirror, the output laser spectrum is multi-peaks at high power output, whereas the total spectrum width is less than 2nm at nearly 1.94μm.     

High Efficiency Continuous-Wave Tm：Ho：GdVO4 Laser Pumped by a Diode

We report a high efficiency cw diode-pumped cryogenic Tin(Sat.%), Ho(0.5at.%):GdV04 laser. The pumping source is a fibre-coupled laser diode with fibre core diameter of 0.4 mm and numerical aperture of 0.3, supplying power 14.8 W at 793.6nm. For input pump power of 13.6 W at 794.2nm, the maximum output power of 4.2 W,optical-to-optical conversion efficiency of 31% and slope efficiency 38% have been attained at 2.0485 μm. To our knowledge, the operating performance is the best among the previously reported Tm:Ho:GdVO4 lasers. We also analyse the influence of pump wavelengths (from 792nm to 794.2nm) on the output power, the optical-to-optical conversion efficiency increases with the longer pump wavelength which is closer to the absorption peak of 797nm in Tm,Ho:GdV04.     

Efficient Diode-Pumped Tm：YALO3 Laser with a Pump Recycling Scheme

By using a pump recycling configuration, the maximum power of 8.1 W in the wavelength range 1.935-1.938 μm is generated by a 5-ram long Tm：YAIOa （4 at.%） laser operating at 18℃ with a pump power of 24 W. The highest slope efficiency of 42% is attained, and the pump quantum efficiency is up to 100%. The Tm：YAlO3 laser is employed as a pumping source of singly-doped Ho（1%）：GdV04 laser operating at room temperature, in which continuous wave output power of greater than 0.2 W at 2.05/μm is achieved with a slope efficiency of 9%.     

Experimental Investigation of Tm3＋-Doped Silica Double-Cladding Fibre Laser

Using a Tm^3＋-doped double-cladding silica fibre, we produce a maximum cw 2.2 W output at approximately 2μm. The highest achieved slope efficiency is 29.3% respect to the launched pump power. The lowest threshold is 1.85 W using the double pass pump method with the fibre length 2. 7m, which is the lowest reported threshold of cladding pump of the ^3H4 level. The fibre laser output peak wavelength ranges from 1.967μm to 2.018μm with cavity 1 （R1 = 1 and R2=0.04） and from 1.95μm to 1.99μm with cavity 2 （R1=0.04 and R2=0.04）, as the fibre length varies.     

Efficient dual-wavelength operation of Nd:LYSO laser by diode pumping aimed toward the absorption peak

By aiming the pump wavelength of the laser diode to the absorption peak at 811 nm of the (Nd 0.005 Lu 0.4975 Y 0.4975 ) 2 SiO 5 (Nd:LYSO) crystal, an efficient dual-wavelength operation at 1 075 and 1 079 nm is obtained. The maximum output power is 702 mW when the incident pump power is 2.53 W, corresponding to an optical conversion efficiency of 27.7% and a slope efficiency of 37.0%     

The LD-Cladding-Pumped High Power Tm^3＋ -doped Silica Fibre Amplifying at Approximately 1.99 μm

A laser diode （LD） cladding-pumped cw Tm^3＋ -doped silica fibre amplifier is reported that provides up to 3 W output with the slope efficiency nearly 30%. The gain fibre is 27.5/400μm D-shaped Tm^3＋ -doped silica double- cladding fibre, and the input signal sources is an LD-pumped Tm^3＋：YAP lasing at 1.99μm. The measured amplified spectrum only stretches a little relative to the input signal spectrum. This is the first report to the authors＇ knowledge of general experimental investigation of cladding-pumped Tm^3＋ -doped fibre amplifier of high power cw at 1.99μm.     

Efficient Tm：YAG Ceramic Laser at 2 μm

We demonstrate a high-efficiency continuous-wave Tm： YAG ceramic laser pumped with a Ti：sapphire laser. An output power up to 860mW is obtained under an absorbed pump power of 2.21 W at 785nm, corresponding to a slope efficiency of 42.1% and optical to optical efficiency of 22%. The measured central wavelength is 2012nm.     

Short Tm^3＋-doped fiber lasers with watt-level output near 2 μm

High-power operation of diode-pumped fiber lasers at wavelength near 2 μm are demonstrated with short length of heavily Tm^3＋-doped silica glass fibers. With 7-cm long fiber, a laser at near 2 μm is obtained with the threshold of 135 mW, maximum output power of 1.09 W, and slope efficiency of 9.6% with respect to the launched power from a laser diode at 790 nm. The output stability of this fiber laser is within 5%. The dependence of the performance of fiber lasers on the operation temperature and cavity configuration parameters is also investigated.     

A Stable 2012.1 nm Single-Longitudinal-Mode Tm：YAG Ceramic Laser with Volume Bragg Grating and Fabry-Perot Etalon

We demonstrate a stable single longitudinal mode Tm：YAG ceramic laser operating at a single wavelength of 2012.1 nm. The single-longitudinal-mode Tin： YAO ceramic laser is obtained by employing volume Bragg grating as one cavity mirror and inserting a Fabry-Perot etalon into the laser cavity. A maximum single longitudinal mode output power of 165roW with a slope efficieney of 6.6% is achieved under the pump power of 5.02 W. The laser has a beam quality of M2 = 1.18 at the maximum single longitudinal mode output power.     

All-Solid-State Nd:YAG Laser Operating at 1064nm and 1319nm under 885nm Thermally Boosted Pumping

We report a high-effciency Nd：YAG laser operating at 1064 nm and 1319nm, respectively, thermally boosted pumped by an all-solid-state Q-switched Ti：sapphire laser at 885 nm. The maximum outputs of 825.4 m W and 459.4mW, at 1064nm and 1319nm respectively, are obtained in a 8-ram-thick 1.1 at.% Nd：YAG crystal with 2.1 W of incident pump power at 885nm, leading to a high slope efficiency with respect to the absorbed pump power of 68.5% and 42.0%. Comparative results obtained by the traditional pumping at 808nm are presented, showing that the slope efficiency and the threshold with respect to the absorbed pump power at 1064nm under the 885nm pumping are 12.2% higher and 7.3% lower than those of 808rim pumping. At 1319nm, the slope efficiency and the threshold with respect to the absorbed pump power under 885nm pumping are 9.9% higher and 3.5% lower than those of 808 nm pumping. The heat generation operating at 1064 nm and 1319 nm is reduced by 19.8% and 11.1%, respectively.     

Characteristics of Nd：GdVO4 Laser with Different Nd-Doping Concentrations

We report the properties of a compact diode-pumped continuous-wave Nd：GdV04 laser with a linear cavity and different Nd-doped laser crystals. In a 0.2at.% Nd-doped Nd：GdVO4 laser, 1.54 W output laser power is achieved at 912nm wavelength with a slope efficiency of 24.8% at an absorbed pump power of 9.4W. With 0.3at.% Nd-doping concentration, we can obtain the either single-wavelength emission at 1064nm or 912nm or the dual-wavelength emission at 1064nm and 912nm by controlling the incident pump power. From an incident pump power of 11.6 W, the 1064nm emission between ^4Fa/2 and ^4I11/2 is suppressed completely by the 912nm emission between ^4Fa/2 and ^4I9/2. We obtain 670 mW output of the 912nm single-wavelength laser emission with a slope efficiency of 5.5% by taking an incident pump power of 18.4 W. Using a Nd：GdV04 laser with 0.4at.% Nd-doping concentration, we obtain either the single-wavelength emission at 1064nm or the dual-wavelength emission at both 1064nm and 912nm by increasing the incident pump power. We observe a strong competition process in the dualavelength laser.     

Blue Up-Conversion Fibre Laser Pumped by a ll20-nm Raman Fibre Laser

A Tm^3 -doped ZrF4-BaF2-LaF3 AlF3-NaF (ZBLAN) fibre up-conversion laser pumped by a 1120-nm Raman fibre laser is demonstrated with blue output power levels up to 116mW. For the output mirror with 80^ reflectivity, the slope efficiency is about 15%, the optical-to-optical conversion efficiency is 11%, and the maximum un-saturated output power is 116mW. For 60% reflectivity, the slope efficiency is about 18% and the opticalto-optical conversion efficiency is 12%, whilst the maximum saturated output power is about 80roW due to the existence of photo-degradation effect in Tm^3 doped ZBLAN glass fibre.