The phase noise and intensity noise of a pulse train are theoretically analyzed in the demodulation measurement. The effect of pulse asymmetry is discussed for the first time using Fourier series. Experimentally, photodetectors with different bandwidth and incident power levels are compared to achieve minimum pulse distortion.
We theoretically prove a multifunctional photonic differentiation (DIFF) scheme based on phase demodulation using two cascaded linear filters. The photonic DIFF has a diversity of output forms, such as 1st order intensity DIFF, 1st order field DIFF and its inversion, 2nd order field DIFF, dependent on the relative shift between the optical carrier and the filter's resonant notches. As a proof, we also experimentally demonstrate the DIFF diversity using a phase modulator and two delay interferometers (DIs). The calculated average deviation is less than 7% for all DIFF waveforms. Our schemes sho…
360-degrees digitalization of three-dimensional (3D) solids using a projected light-strip is a well established technique. These profilometers project a light-strip over the solid under analysis while the solid is rotated a full revolution. Then a computer program typically extracts the centroid of this light-strip, and by triangulation one obtains the shape of the solid. Here instead of using intensity-based strip centroid estimation, we propose to use Fourier phase-demodulation. This 360-degrees profilometer first constructs a carrier-frequency fringe-pattern by closely adding individual lig…
We report on the formation of various intensity pattern types in detuned Fourier domain mode-locked (FDML) lasers and identify the corresponding operating conditions. Such patterns are a result of the complex laser dynamics and serve as an ideal tool for the study of the underlying physical processes as well as for model verification. By numerical simulation we deduce that the formation of patterns is related to the spectral position of the instantaneous laser lineshape with respect to the transmission window of the swept bandpass filter. The spectral properties of the lineshape are determined…
We report on the experimental investigation of the efficiency of some nonlinear crystals to generate microwave (RF) radiation as a result of optical rectification (OR) when irradiated with intense pulse trains delivered by a mode-locked laser at $1064\,$nm. We have investigated lithium triborate (LBO), lithium niobate (LiNbO$_3$), zinc selenide (ZnSe), and also potassium titanyl orthophosphate (KTP) for comparison with previous measurements. The results are in good agreement with the theoretical predictions based on the form of the second-order nonlinear susceptibility tensor. For some crystal…
A source of ultrashort pulses of light in the 2 μm region was constructed using supercontinuum broadening from an erbium mode-locked laser. The output spectrum spanned 1000 nm to 2200 nm with an average power of 250 mW. A pulse width of 39 fs for part of the spectrum in the 2000 nm region, corresponding to less than six optical cycles, was achieved. A heterodyne measurement of the free-running mode-locked laser with a narrow-linewidth continuous wave laser resulted in a near shot noise-limited beat note with a signal-to-noise ratio of 45 dB in a 10 kHz resolution bandwidth. The relative intens…
In this work, we investigate the steady-states of a fiber lasers mode-locked with a nonlinear amplifying loop-mirror that has an inherent amplitude noise-suppression mechanism. Due to the interaction of the sinusoidal transmission function with the fluctuating intracavity pulse amplitude we show that this mechanism may lead to a detectable difference in relative intensity noise at the reflected and transmitted output port under specific preconditions. We present systematic intensity noise measurements with a nonlinear fiber-based system that replicates a single roundtrip in the laser cavity. E…
A bidirectional mode-locked fiber laser producing two correlated frequency combs of the same repetition rate is demonstrated. The intensity dependence of pulse and phase velocities are measured simultaneously. As expected, the phase delay is determined by the linear and nonlinear indices of refraction. The nonlinear Kerr effect contribution to the pulse velocity is dwarfed by a contribution from saturable gain dynamics.
In this work, we identify and characterize intra-pulse intensity noise shaping by saturable absorbers applied in mode-locked lasers and ultra-low noise nonlinear fiber amplifiers. Reshaped intra-pulse intensity noise distributions are shown to be inevitably interconnected with self-amplitude modulation, the fundamental physical mechanism for initiation and stabilization of ultra-short pulses in the steady-state of a mode-locked laser. A theoretical model is used to describe the ultrafast saturation dynamics by an intra-pulse noise transfer function for widely-applied slow and fast saturable ab…
Physical systems with co-existence and interplay of processes featuring distinct spatio-temporal scales are found in various research areas ranging from studies of brain activity to astrophysics. Complexity of such systems makes their theoretical and experimental analysis technically and conceptually challenging. Here, we discover that radiation of partially mode-locked fibre lasers, while being stochastic and intermittent on short time scale, exhibits periodicity and long scale correlations over slow evolution from one round trip to another. The evolution mapping of intensity auto-correlation…
Beat note measurements between a mode-locked and a continuous-wave laser as well as between two mode-locked sources were used to demonstrate that the sub-threshold, cavity filtered, amplified spontaneous emission is not stationary even when a fast mode-locking mechanism, such as nonlinear polarization rotation, is used to generate short pulses. A relatively small gain modulation of a few percents created by high intensity pulses can produce a significant modulation of the amplified noise once synchronously accumulated over several cavity round-trips, even if the repetition rate is faster than …
Sub-sampling can acquire directly a passband within a broad radio frequency (RF) range, avoiding down-conversion and low-phase-noise tunable local oscillation (LO). However, sub-sampling suffers from band folding and self-image interference. In this paper we propose a frequency-oriented sub-sampling to solve the two problems. With ultrashort optical pulse and a pair of chromatic dispersions, the broadband RF signal is firstly short-time Fourier-transformed to a spectrum-spread pulse. Then a time slot, corresponding to the target spectrum slice, is coherently optical-sampled with in-phase/quadr…
Transitions between different kinds of soliton solutions of Ginzburg-Landau equation (GLE) have been studied experimentally in a mode-locked fiber laser. It is demonstrated that the different kinds of solitons corresponding to different solutions of GLE can be generated in a single mode-locked laser. Dispersion-managed solitons (DM), all-normal-dispersion solitons (ANDi) and similaritons can be emitted respectively depending on the parameter of the intensity of the light field and the birefringence effect. The three nonlinear waves show different features especially the spectrum shapes and dyn…
Two-dimensional mono-elemental material is an excellent saturable absorber candidate with low saturation intensity, large modulation depth, high nonlinearities, and fast recovery time of excited carriers. Typically, these mono-elemental material with two-dimensional structure possesses tunable bandgap from metallic to semiconducting according to different number of layers. The successful application of these materials as the saturable absorber has exploited the development of mode-locked fiber lasers. Therefore, this review is intended to provide an up-to-date information to the development of…
A driven opto-RF oscillator, consisting of a dual-frequency laser (DFL) submitted to frequency-shifted feedback, is studied experimentally and numerically in a chaotic regime. Precise control of the reinjection strength and detuning permits to isolate a parameter region of bounded-phase chaos, where the opto-RF oscillator is frequency-locked to the master oscillator, in spite of chaotic phase and intensity oscillations. Robust experimental evidence of this synchronization regime is found and phase noise spectra allows to compare phase-locking and bounded-phase chaos regimes. In particular, it …
We demonstrate ultra-low timing jitter optical pulse trains from free- running, 80 MHz repetition rate, mode-locked Yb-fiber lasers. Timing jitter of various mode-locking conditions at close-to-zero intra-cavity dispersion (-0.004 to +0.002 ps2 range at 1040 nm center wavelength) is characterized using a sub-20-attosecond-resolution balanced optical cross-correlation method. The measured lowest rms timing jitter is 175 attoseconds when integrated from 10 kHz to 40 MHz (Nyquist frequency) offset frequency range, which corresponds to the record-low timing jitter from free-running mode-locked fib…
A novel mode-locked fiber laser based on offset splicing technology between two kinds of graded index multimode fibers is proposed and experimentally demonstrated. The offset splice spot structure acts as a saturable absorber via nonlinear multimodal interference mechanism. The absorption modulation depth of the device is 2.8%, with a saturation intensity of 2.5 MW/cm2. The fiber laser operates at a stable mode-locked state when the pump power reaches 114 mW. The laser oscillates at 1039 nm with a pulsewidth of 17.6 ps, a repetition rate of 32.619 MHz, and a high signal noise ratio of 65 dB. T…
Understanding the dynamics of Fourier domain mode-locked (FDML) lasers is crucial for determining physical coherence limits, and for finding new superior methods for experimental realization. In addition, the rich interplay of linear and nonlinear effects in a laser ring system is of great theoretical interest. Here we investigate the dynamics of a highly dispersion-compensated setup, where over a bandwidth of more than 100 nm, a highly coherent output with nearly shot-noise-limited intensity fluctuations was experimentally demonstrated. This output is called the sweet-spot. We show by numeric…
We report numerical simulations on the high-order group-velocity-locked vector soliton (GVLVS) generation based on the fundamental GVLVS. The high-order GVLVS generated is characterized with a two-humped pulse along one polarization while a single-humped pulse along the orthogonal polarization. The phase difference between the two humps could be 180 degree. It is found that by appropriate setting the time separation between the two components of the fundamental GVLVS, the high-order GVLVS with different pulse width and pulse intensity could be obtained. 1+2 and 2+2 type high-order GVLVS could …
In this work, we investigate an approach to scale up the output pulse energy in an all polarization-maintaining 17 MHz Yb-doped fiber oscillator via implementation of 25 um core-diameter large-mode-area fibers. The artificial saturable absorber in form of a Kerr-type self-stabilized fiber-interferometer enables highly stable mode-locked steady-states in the soliton-like operation regime with 170 mW average output power and a total output pulse energy of ~10 nJ distributed between two output ports. An experimental parameter comparison with a reference oscillator made of 5.5 um core-sized standa…
We report on the characterization of the timing stability of passively mode-locked discrete mode diode laser sources. These are edge-emitting devices with a spatially varying refractive index profile for spectral filtering. Two devices with a mode-locking frequency of 100 GHz are characterized. The first device is designed to support a comb of six modes and generates near Fourier limited 1.9 ps pulses. The second supports four primary modes resulting in a sinusoidal modulation of the optical intensity. Using a cross-correlation technique, we measured a 20 fs pulse to pulse timing jitter for th…
We report on the experimental observation of a novel type of polarization locked vector soliton in a passively mode-locked fiber laser. The vector soliton is characterized by that not only the two orthogonally polarized soliton components are phase locked, but also one of the components has a double-humped intensity profile. Multiple such phase-locked high order vector solitons with identical soliton parameters and harmonic mode-locking of the vector solitons were also obtained in the laser. Numerical simulations confirmed the existence of stable high-order vector solitons in fiber lasers.
Dynamic characterization of self-induced beating sinusoidal wave (BSW) oscillations and related phenomena, which were previously explored in a thin-slice dual-polarization solid-state laser operating in the regime of incomplete mode-locking of orthogonally polarized transverse eigenmodes, namely, a quasi-locked state [Laser Physics Letters, 15 (2018) 075001], is performed in terms of the amplitude correlation coefficient and intensity circulation among various orthogonally polarized mode pairs. Polarization-dependent symmetry-breaking featuring a nonreciprocal intensity flow for different orth…
Soliton strings in mode-locked lasers are obtained using a variant of the nonlinear Schrodinger equation, appropriately modified to model power (intensity) and energy saturation. This equation goes beyond the well-known master equation often used to model these systems. It admits mode-locking and soliton strings in both the constant dispersion and dispersion-managed systems in the (net) anomalous and normal regimes; the master equation is contained as a limiting case. Analysis of soliton interactions show that soliton strings can form when pulses are a certain distance apart relative to their …
The different dynamical behaviors of the Hermite-Gaussian (HG) modes of mode-locked nanolasers based on a harmonic photonic cavity are investigated in detail using a model based on a modified Gross-Pitaevskii Equation. Such nanolasers are shown to exhibit mode-locking with a repetition rate independent of the cavity length, which is a strong asset for compactness.The differences with respect to conventional lasers are shown to originate from the peculiar gain competition between HG modes, which is investigated in details. In the presence of a saturable absorber, the different regimes, i. e. Q-…
Fiber lasers operating via Raman gain or based on rare-earth doped active fibers are widely used as sources of CW radiation. However these lasers are only quasi-CW: their intensity fluctuates strongly on short time-scales. Here the framework of the complex Ginzburg-Landau equations, that are well known as an efficient model of mode-locked fiber lasers, is applied for the description of quasi-CW fiber lasers as well. The first ever vector model of a Raman fiber laser describes the experimentally observed turbulent-like intensity dynamics, as well as polarization rogue waves. Our results open de…
Using an asymptotic technique we develop a generalized version of class-B Haus partial differential equation mode-locking model that accounts for both the slow gain response to the averaged value of the field intensity and the fast gain dynamics on the scale comparable to the pulse duration. We show that unlike the conventional class-B Haus mode-locked model, our model is able to describe not only Q-switched instability of the fundamental mode-locked regime, but also the leading edge instability leading to harmonic mode-locked regimes with the increase of the pump power.
Physics phenomena of multi-soliton complexes have enriched the life of dissipative solitons in fiber lasers. By developing a birefringence-enhanced fiber laser, we report the first experimental observation of group-velocity-locked vector soliton (GVLVS) molecules. The birefringence-enhanced fiber laser facilitates the generation of GVLVSs, where the two orthogonally polarized components are coupled together to form a multi-soliton complex. Moreover, the interaction of repulsive and attractive forces between multiple pulses binds the particle-like GVLVSs together in time domain to further form …
Phase noise is very important for the ultrafast pulse application in telecommunication, ultrafast diagnose, material science, and biology. In this paper, two types of carbon nano-materials, single-wall carbon nanotube and graphene oxide, are investigated for noise suppression in ultrafast photonics. Various properties of the wall-paper SAs, such as saturable intensity, optical absorption and degree of purity, are found to be key factors determining the phase noise of the ultrafast pulses. A reduced-noise femtosecond fiber laser is experimentally demonstrated by optimizing the above parameters …
Amplified spontaneous emission (ASE) causes fluctuations of pulse energy, of the optical phase and of the timing of the pulse intensity envelope in a mode-locked laser or frequency comb. Starting from the assumption of one ASE photon per longitudinal laser mode and roundtrip, we rederive analytic equations for the three fundamental types of quantum noise in a laser. To this end, we analyze the interference of the coherent intracavity field and a spectrally localized ASE photon as a function of wavelength and phase of the latter. Performing an integration over all wavelengths and phases and tak…
We demonstrate a compact source of energetic and phase-locked multi-terahertz pulses at a repetition rate of 190 kHz. Difference frequency mixing of the fundamental output of an Yb:KGW amplifier with the idler of an optical parametric amplifier in GaSe and LiGaS2 crystals yields a passively phase-locked train of waveforms tunable between 12 and 42 THz. The shortest multi-terahertz pulses contain 1.8 oscillation cycles within the intensity FWHM. Pulse energies of up to 0.16 μJ and peak electric fields of 13 MV/cm are achieved. Electro-optic sampling reveals a phase stability better than 0.1 $π$…
We propose a nonlinear fiber system for shot-noise limited, all-optical intensity-noise reduction and signal amplification. The mechanism is based on the accumulation of different nonlinear phase shifts between orthogonal polarization modes in a polarization-maintaining fiber amplifier in combination with an implemented sinusoidal transmission-function. The resulting correlation between the input intensity-fluctuations and the system transmission enables tunable intensity noise reduction of the input pulse train. In the experiment, the noise spectral density of a mode-locked oscillator is supp…
Stochastically driven nonlinear processes limit the number of amplified modes in a natural system due to competitive mode interaction, which is accompanied by loss of coherence when increasing the complexity of system. Specifically, we find that modulation instability, which exhibits great fluctuations when it is spontaneously grown from noise in conservative systems, may possess a high degree of coherence in dissipative laser system with gain. Nonlinear mode interactions can be competitive or cooperative: adjusting the intracavity polarization state controls the process of loss of coherence. …
We reported on the generation of femtosecond pulse in an anomalous-dispersion fiber ring laser by using a polyvinyl alcohol (PVA)-based Topological Insulator (TI), Bi2Se3 saturable absorber (SA). The PVA-TI composite has a low saturable optical intensity of 12 MW/cm2 and a modulation depth of ~3.9%. By incorporating the fabricated PVA-TISA into a fiber laser, mode-locking operation could be achieved at a low pump threshold of 25 mW. After an optimization of the cavity parameters, optical pulse with ~660 fs centered at 1557.5 nm wavelength had been generated. The experimental results demonstrat…
The self-starting dynamics of a model for passively mode-locked lasers with saturable absorber, in which the optical amplifier has a saturable nonlinearity, is examined. The basic assumption is that the laser will operate in the mode-locked regime when the continuous-wave regime becomes unstable. Within the framework of the modulational-instability analysis, a global map for the laser self-starting criteria is constructed. According to this map, the saturable nonlinearity enhances the input-field intensity required for laser self-starting. Analytical expression of the zero modulation-frequency…
Higher repetition-rate optical pulse trains have been desired for various applications such as high-bit-rate optical communication, photonic analogue-to-digital conversion, and multi- photon imaging. Generation of multi GHz and higher repetition-rate optical pulse trains directly from mode-locked oscillators is often challenging. As an alternative, harmonic injection locking can be applied for extra-cavity repetition-rate multiplication (RRM). Here we have investigated the operation conditions and achievable performances of all-fibre, highly tunable harmonic injection locking-based pulse RRM. …
We demonstrate 14.3-attosecond timing jitter [integrated from 10 kHz to 94 MHz offset frequency] optical pulse trains from 188-MHz repetition-rate mode-locked Yb-fiber lasers. In order to minimize the timing jitter, we shorten the non-gain fiber length to shorten the pulsewidth and reduce excessive higher-order nonlinearity and nonlinear chirp in the fiber laser. The measured jitter spectrum is limited by the amplified spontaneous emission limited quantum noise in the 100 kHz - 1 MHz offset frequency range, while it was limited by the relative intensity noise-converted jitter in the lower offs…
High-precision passive stabilization of repetition rate for a mode-locked fiber laser based on optical pulse injection
East China Normal University(华东师范大学);University of Shanghai for Science and Technology(上海理工大学);Chongqing Institute of East China Normal University(华东师范大学重庆研究院);Jinan Institute of Quantum Technology(济南量子技术研究院);Shanghai Research Center for Quantum Sciences(上海量子科学研究中心)
The coherent interaction of light with matter imprints the phase information of the light field on the wavefunction of the photon-dressed electronic state. Driving electric field, together with a stable phase that is associated with the optical probe pulses, enables the role of the dressed state in the optical response to be investigated. We observed optical absorption strengths modulated on a sub-cycle timescale in a GaAs quantum well in the presence of a multi-cycle terahertz driving pulse using a near-infrared probe pulse. The measurements were in good agreement with the analytical formula …
We generate 555.8nm light with sub-MHz linewidth through the use of laser injection-locking of a semiconductor diode at 1111.6nm, followed by frequency doubling in a resonant cavity. The integrity of the injection lock is investigated by studying an offset-beat signal between slave and master lasers, by performing spectroscopy on the $(6s)^{2}$ $^{1}S_{0}-\,(6s6p)$ $^{3}P_{1}$ transition in magneto-optically trapped ytterbium, and by demonstrating additional laser cooling of $^{171}$Yb with the 555.8nm light. For the $^{1}S_{0}-$ $^{3}P_{1}$ spectroscopy, we confirm the linear dependence betwe…
We demonstrate three-photon excitation in quantum dots with a mode-locked fiber laser operating in the telecommunications band. We compare spectra and intensity dependence of fluorescence from one- and three-photon excitation of commercially available 640 nm quantum dots, using a 372 nm diode laser for one-photon excitation and 116 fs pulses from a mode-locked fiber laser with a center wavelength of 1575 nm for three-photon excitation.
Investigation on the relative phase evolution between two bounded optical solitons is essential for its potential applications in development of larger telecommunication capacity of optical fiber transmission lines, resolution improvement in advancing ultrafast characterization approaches and development of all-optical information storage. Here we characterized relative comb-line phase jitter power spectral density (PSD) of a soliton molecule pair generated from a passively mode-locked Er:fiber laser. Through tracking the intensity difference between two selected wavelengths in one certain spe…
We demonstrate that the intrinsic properties of monolayer graphene allow it to act as a more effective saturable absorber for mode-locking fiber lasers compared to multilayer graphene. The absorption of monolayer graphene can be saturated at lower excitation intensity compared to multilayer graphene, graphene with wrinkle-like defects, and functionalized graphene. Monolayer graphene has a remarkable large modulation depth of 95.3%, whereas the modulation depth of multilayer graphene is greatly reduced due to nonsaturable absorption and scattering loss. Picoseconds ultrafast laser pulse (1.23 p…
Mode-locking operation and multimode instabilities in Terahertz (THz) quantum cascade lasers (QCLs) have been intensively investigated during the last decade. These studies have unveiled a rich phenomenology, owing to the unique properties of these lasers, in particular their ultrafast gain medium. Thanks to this, in QCLs a modulation of the intracavity field intensity gives rise to a strong modulation of the population inversion, directly affecting the laser current. In this work we show that this property can be used to study the real-time dynamics of multimode THz QCLs, using a self-detecti…
We demonstrate a novel, robust and compact fiber laser mode-locked by nonlinear polarization evolution (NPE) in polarization-maintaining (PM) fibers. The reflectivity of the artificial saturable absorber (SA) is analyzed to explain the mode-locking mechanism in the laser cavity. Experimentally, three linear laser schemes that feature repetition rates 94 MHz, 124 MHz and 133 MHz are systematically investigated. When the pump power is 1100 mW, the 124-MHz laser cavity delivers highly stable pulses with a single-pulse energy of 0.92 nJ. After the compression, the pulse duration obtained from the …
We report a versatile and cost-effective way of controlling the unsaturated loss, modulation depth and saturation fluence of graphene-based saturable absorbers (GSAs), by changing the thickness of a spacer between SLG and a high-reflection mirror. This allows us to modulate the electric field intensity enhancement at the GSA from 0 up to 400%, due to the interference of incident and reflected light at the mirror. The unsaturated loss of the SLG-mirror-assembly can be reduced to$\sim$0. We use this to mode-lock a VECSEL from 935 to 981nm. This approach can be applied to integrate SLG into vario…
It is shown that optical synthesis of terahertz and millimeter-wave frequencies can be achieved using two-mode and mode-locked discrete mode diode lasers. These edge-emitting devices incorporate a spatially varying refractive index profile which is designed according to the spectral output desired of the laser. We first demonstrate a device which supports two primary modes simultaneously with high spectral purity. In this case sinusoidal modulation of the optical intensity at terahertz frequencies can be obtained. Cross saturation of the material gain in quantum well lasers prevents simultaneo…
Low cost, small footprint, highly efficient and mass producible on-chip wavelength-division-multiplexing (WDM) light sources are key components in future silicon electronic and photonic integrated circuits (EPICs) which can fulfill the rapidly increasing bandwidth and lower energy per bit requirements. We present here, for the first time, a low noise high-channel-count 20 GHz passively mode-locked quantum dot laser grown on complementary metal-oxide-semiconductor compatible on-axis (001) silicon substrate. The laser demonstrates a wide mode-locking regime in the O-band. A record low timing jit…
The dynamics and stability of continuous-wave and multi-pulse structures are studied theoretically, for a generalized model of passively mode-locked fiber laser with an arbitrary nonlinearity. The model is characterized by a complex Ginzburg-Landau equation with saturable nonlinearity of a general form ($I^m/(1+ΓI)^n$), where $I$ is the field intensity, $m$ and $n$ are two positive real numbers and $Γ$ is the optical field saturation power. The analysis of fixed-point solutions of the governing equations, reveals an interesting loci of singular points in the amplitude-frequency plane consistin…