Efficient 1.9 &mgr;m Tm3+/Yb3+-doped tellurite fibre laser

We report a Tm3+/Yb3+-doped tellurite fibre laser operating at wavelengths in the range 1879 - 1994 nm. Two different pump schemes have been demonstrated for this laser: a 1088 nm Yb3+-doped silica fibre laser simultaneously pumping the Tm3+: 3H5 and Yb3+: 2F5/2 levels, and a 1610 nm Er3+/Yb3+-doped silica fibre laser directly pumping the Tm3+: 3F4 upper laser level. For the 1610 nm pumping, a slope efficiency of 76% has been achieved in a 32 cm long fibre which is very close to the Stoke efficiency limit of ~80%. An output power of 283 mW has also been achieved, but with no signs of saturation or fibre damage suggesting that higher output powers should be possible. For the 1088 nm pumping there is very strong pump ESA resulting in bright blue (480 nm) and near-IR (800 nm) emission and this limits the achievable slope efficiency, which in this case was a maximum of 10% for a 16 cm long fibre. With this pump scheme, the highest observed output power was 67 mW, and further power scaling was limited due to the intense ESA and thermal damage to the pump end of the fibre. Lasing has been achieved in <10 cm lengths of this fibre making this material a promising candidate for ultra compact medium power mid-IR laser sources for range-finding, medical and atmospheric monitoring and sensing applications.

[1]  D. Hanna,et al.  High-power cladding-pumped Tm-doped silica fiber laser with wavelength tuning from 1860 to 2090 nm. , 2002, Optics letters.

[2]  S. Jackson,et al.  Power scaling method for 2-microm diode-cladding-pumped Tm(3+)-doped silica fiber lasers that uses Yb(3+) codoping. , 2003, Optics letters.

[3]  A Jha,et al.  Tm(3+)-Doped Tellurite Glass for a Broadband Amplifier at 1.47 num. , 2000, Applied optics.

[4]  N. Peyghambarian,et al.  Efficient thulium-doped 2-/spl mu/m germanate fiber laser , 2006, IEEE Photonics Technology Letters.

[5]  H. Poignant,et al.  Tunable CW lasing around 0.82, 1.48, 1.88 and 2.35 mu m in thulium-doped fluorozirconate fibre , 1989 .

[6]  Animesh Jha,et al.  Structural origin of spectral broadening of 1.5-μm emission in Er 3+ -doped tellurite glasses , 2000 .

[7]  Anne C. Tropper,et al.  Continuous-wave oscillation of a monomode thulium-doped silica fibre laser , 1989 .

[8]  E. Vogel,et al.  Neodymium-doped tellurite single-mode fiber laser. , 1994, Optics letters.

[9]  Terence A. King,et al.  Dynamics and self-pulsing effects in Tm3+-doped silica fibre lasers , 2002 .

[10]  Yasutake Ohishi,et al.  Erbium-doped tellurite glass fibre laser and amplifier , 1997 .

[11]  D. C. Hanna,et al.  Efficient high-power continuous-wave operation of monomode Tm-doped fibre laser at 2 mu m pumped by Nd:YAG laser at 1.064 mu m , 1989 .

[12]  E. M. Vogel,et al.  Tellurite glass: a new candidate for fiber devices , 1994 .

[13]  T. King,et al.  High-power diode-cladding-pumped Tm-doped silica fiber laser. , 1998, Optics letters.

[14]  Setsuhisa Tanabe,et al.  Optical parameters and upconversion fluorescence in Tm3+/Yb3+-doped alkali-barium-bismuth-tellurite glasses. , 2006, Spectrochimica acta. Part A, Molecular and biomolecular spectroscopy.

[15]  Anne C. Tropper,et al.  CW diode-pumped operation of 1.97 mu m thulium-doped fluorozirconate fibre laser , 1990 .

[16]  Animesh Jha,et al.  Emission spectroscopy and energy transfer in Tm3+, Tm3+-Ho3+, and Tm3+-Yb3+ doped tellurite fibers , 2006, SPIE Remote Sensing.

[17]  Steven T. Davey,et al.  Highly efficient CW cascade operation of 1.47 and 1.82 mu m transitions in Tm-doped fluoride fibre laser , 1992 .

[18]  D. C. Hanna,et al.  A 1-Watt thulium-doped cw fibre laser operating at 2 μm , 1990 .

[19]  Jirong Yu,et al.  Efficient operation of diode-pumped single-frequency thulium-doped fiber lasers near 2 micro m. , 2007, Optics letters.

[20]  S. Davey,et al.  Highly efficient and tunable operation of two colour Tm-doped fluoride fibre laser , 1992 .

[21]  Animesh Jha,et al.  Infrared emission and energy transfer in Tm(3+), Tm(3+)-Ho(3+) and Tm(3+)-Yb(3+)-doped tellurite fibre. , 2007, Optics express.

[22]  CONTINUOUS-WAVE OSCILLATION OF TM 3+ DOPED FIBER LASER AT 1.9µm AND 2.3µm , 2002 .

[23]  Zhidong Yao,et al.  Highly efficient high-power thulium-doped germanate glass fiber laser. , 2007, Optics letters.

[24]  Terence A. King,et al.  High power 1.9 μm Tm3+-silica fibre laser pumped at 1.09 μm by a Yb3+-silica fibre laser , 2004 .