• Photonics Research
  • Vol. 7, Issue 7, 798 (2019)
Yujia Li1, Ligang Huang1、*, Haonan Han1, Lei Gao1, Yulong Cao1, Yuan Gong2, Wending Zhang3, Feng Gao4, Iroegbu Paul Ikechukwu1, and Tao Zhu1、5
Author Affiliations
  • 1Key Laboratory of Optoelectronic Technology & Systems, Ministry of Education, Chongqing University, Chongqing 400044, China
  • 2Key Laboratory of Optical Fiber Sensing and Communications, Ministry of Education, University of Electronic Science and Technology of China, Chengdu 611731, China
  • 3MOE Key Laboratory of Material Physics and Chemistry under Extraordinary Conditions and Shaanxi Key Laboratory of Optical Information Technology, School of Science, Northwestern Polytechnical University, Xi’an 710072, China
  • 4MOE Key Laboratory of Weak-Light Nonlinear Photonics, TEDA Applied Physics Institute and School of Physics, Nankai University, Tianjin 300457, China
  • 5e-mail: zhutao@cqu.edu.cn
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    DOI: 10.1364/PRJ.7.000798 Cite this Article Set citation alerts
    Yujia Li, Ligang Huang, Haonan Han, Lei Gao, Yulong Cao, Yuan Gong, Wending Zhang, Feng Gao, Iroegbu Paul Ikechukwu, Tao Zhu. Acousto-optic tunable ultrafast laser with vector-mode-coupling-induced polarization conversion[J]. Photonics Research, 2019, 7(7): 798 Copy Citation Text show less

    Abstract

    Acousto-optic interactions, employed in the ultrafast laser regulation, possess remarkable advantages for fast tuning performance in a wide spectral range. Here, we propose an ultrafast fiber laser whose wideband tunability is provided by an acousto-optic structure fabricated with an etched single-mode fiber. Because of the laser polarization conversion induced by the coupling between the core and cladding vector modes in the etched fiber, a band-pass characteristic of the acousto-optic interaction is achieved to effectively regulate the inner-cavity gain range. Cooperating with a saturable absorber based on single-wall carbon nanotubes (SWCNTs) with polarization robustness, a soliton operating state is achieved in the tunable erbium-doped fiber laser. By controlling the acoustical wave frequency from 1.039 to 1.069 MHz, this soliton laser can be conveniently tuned in a wide spectral range from 1571.52 to 1539.26 nm. Meanwhile, the laser pulses have near-transform-limited durations stably maintaining less than 2 ps at different wavelength channels, owing to the broadband nonlinear absorption of SWCNTs.

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    Yujia Li, Ligang Huang, Haonan Han, Lei Gao, Yulong Cao, Yuan Gong, Wending Zhang, Feng Gao, Iroegbu Paul Ikechukwu, Tao Zhu. Acousto-optic tunable ultrafast laser with vector-mode-coupling-induced polarization conversion[J]. Photonics Research, 2019, 7(7): 798
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