Broadband noise on supercontinuum spectra generated in microstructure fiber is shown to lead to amplitude fluctuations as large as 50 % for certain input laser pulse parameters. We study this noise using both experimental measurements and numerical simulations with a generalized stochastic nonlinear Schroedinger equation, finding good quantitative agreement over a range of input pulse energies and chirp values. This noise is shown to arise from nonlinear amplification of two quantum noise inputs: the input pulse shot noise and the spontaneous Raman scattering down the fiber.
We demonstrate broadband supercontinuum generation in an all-normal dispersion polarization-maintaining photonic crystal fiber and we report the observation of a cross-phase modulation instability sideband that is generated outside of the supercontinuum bandwidth. We demonstrate this sideband is polarized on the slow axis and can be suppressed by pumping on the fiber's fast axis. We theoretically confirm and model this nonlinear process using phase-matching conditions and numerical simulations, obtaining good agreement with the measured data.
A novel method for efficient generation of high power, equalized continuous-wave supercontinuum source in an all conventional silica fiber architecture is demonstrated. Highly nonlinear fiber (HNLF) is pumped in its anomalous dispersion region using a novel, high power, L-band laser. The L-band laser encompasses a 6th order cascaded Raman amplifier which is pumped with a high power Ytterbium doped fiber laser and amplifies a low-power, tunable L-band seed source. The supercontinuum generated 35W of power with ~40% efficiency. The Supercontinuum spectrum was measured to have a high degree of fl…
Blue-enhanced, broadband supercontinuum generation in a 50 um core fluorine-doped graded-index multimode fiber is demonstrated by pumping with a 1064 nm picosecond source. Multi-octave supercontinuum spectrum extending from ~400 nm to 2,400 nm is achieved in a relatively short fiber. The measured spectrum and multimode nonlinear properties are compared to those of a germanium-doped graded-index multimode fiber. It is shown that engineering the glass composition and thus its chromatic dispersion and absorption characteristics, provides a novel and effective approach to further controlling the n…
We present the use of linearly down-tapered gas-filled hollow-core photonic crystal fiber in a single-stage, pumped with pulses from a compact infrared laser source, to generate a supercontinuum carrying significant spectral power in the deep ultraviolet (200 - 300 nm). The generated supercontinuum extends from the near infrared down to around 213 nm with up to 0.83 mW/nm in the deep ultraviolet.
We report the amplification of an all-normal dispersion supercontinuum pulse in a Thulium / Holmium co-doped all-fiber chirped pulse amplification system. With a -20 dB bandwidth of more than 300 nm in the range 1800-2100 nm the system delivers high quality 66 fs pulses with more than 70 kW peak power directly from the output fiber. The coherent seeding of the entire emission bandwidth of the doped fiber and the stability of the supercontinuum generation dynamics in the silicate glass all-normal dispersion photonic crystal fiber result in excellent noise characteristics of the amplified ultras…
We demonstrate a route to supercontinuum generation in gas-filled hollow-core anti-resonant fibers through the creation of a broad vibrational Raman frequency comb followed by continuous broadening and merging of the comb lines through either rotational Raman scattering or the optical Kerr effect. Our demonstration experiments, utilizing a single pump pulse with 20 ps duration at 532 nm in a nitrogen-filled fiber, produce a supercontinuum spanning from 440 nm to 1200 nm, with an additional deep ultraviolet continuum from 250 nm to 360 nm. Numerical results suggest that this approach can produc…
We demonstrate the generation of a low-noise, octave-spanning mid-infrared supercontinuum from 1700 to 4800 nm by injecting femtosecond pulses into the normal dispersion regime of a multimode step-index chalcogenide fiber with 100 $μ$m core diameter. We conduct a systematic study of the intensity noise across the supercontinuum spectrum and show that the initial fluctuations of the pump laser are at most amplified by a factor of three. We also perform a comparison with the noise characteristics of an octave-spanning supercontinuum generated in the anomalous dispersion regime of a multimode flu…
Picosecond Supercontinuum Generation in All-Normal Dispersion Optical Fibers Enabled by Polarization Instabilities
Université Marie et Louis Pasteur, CNRS, Institut FEMTO-ST（玛丽和路易·巴斯德大学，法国国家科学研究中心，FEMTO-ST研究所）；Université de Lille, CNRS, PhLAM-Physique des Lasers Atomes et Molécules（里尔大学，法国国家科学研究中心，PhLAM激光原子与分子物理实验室）
We experimentally demonstrate that pumping a graded-index multimode fiber with sub-ns pulses from a microchip Nd:YAG laser leads to spectrally flat supercontinuum generation with a uniform bell-shaped spatial beam profile extending from the visible to the mid-infrared at 2500\,nm. We study the development of the supercontinuum along the multimode fiber by the cut-back method, which permits us to analyze the competition between the Kerr-induced geometric parametric instability and stimulated Raman scattering. We also performed a spectrally resolved temporal analysis of the supercontinuum emissi…
Graded-index multimode fibers can handle high average powers and feature unique nonlinear dynamics due to spatio-temporal evolution of the light inside. We report on generation of octave-spanning spectrally flat supercontinua in graded-index multimode fibers using a compact, ytterbium-doped all-fiber laser system. Supercontinua with output powers as high as $\sim$4 W and 2 MHz repetition rate obtained with more than 1 $μ$m spectral bandwidth. Evolution of supercontinuum is investigated by studying the effect of launch power, repetition rate, fiber length and core size. Numerical simulations ar…
We study numerically and experimentally supercontinuum generation in optical fibers with dark and bright solitons simultaneously contributing into the spectral broadening and dispersive wave generation. We report a novel type of weak trapped radiation arising due to interaction of bright solitons with the dark soliton background. This radiation expresses itself as two pulses with the continuously shifting spectra constituting the short and long wavelength limits of the continuum. Our theoretical and experimental results are in good agreement.
We report on designing, fabrication and experimental characterization of highly nonlinear, tellurite glass photonic crystal fibers with engineered normal dispersion characteristics for coherent supercontinuum generation. Effectively single mode, air-hole lattice fibers, with measured, all-normal dispersion profiles as flat as -10 to -50 ps/mn/km over 1500-2400 nm wavelengths are developed and investigated. Supercontinuum spectra are measured for these fibers, with a spectral width covering 1100-2600 nm wavelengths under pumping with a robust, fixed-wavelength erbium fiber-based femtosecond las…
We present a new spatial-spectral mapping technique permitting to measure the beam intensity at the output of a graded-index (GRIN) multimode fiber with sub-nanometric spectral resolution. We apply this method to visualize the fine structure of the beam shape of a sideband generated at 1870 nm by geometric parametric instability (GPI) in a GRIN fiber. After spatial-spectral characterization, we amplify the GPI sideband with a Tm-doped fiber amplifier to obtain a microjoule-scale picosecond pump whose spectrum is finally broadened in a segment of InF3 optical fiber to achieve supercontinuum ran…
We demonstrate the broadband supercontinuum (SC) generation in photonic crystal fiber (PCF), highly nonlinear fiber (HNLF) and ZBLAN (ZrF4-BaF2-LaF3-AlF3-NaF) fiber with a passively mode-locked erbium-doped fiber laser (EDFL). The passively mode-locked EDFL incorporates a CNT-based saturable absorber and has achieved a pulse width of 620 fs with a pulse repetition rate of 18 MHz. The spectral broadening phenomena inside each fiber has been observed with respect to the variation in seed pulse power. The SC spectrum bandwidth of 1050 nm, 1400 nm, and 2000 nm has been achieved using PCF, HNLF, an…
We demonstrate a simple module for octave spanning continuous-wave supercontinuum generation using standard telecom fiber. This module can accept any high power Ytterbium-doped fiber laser as input. The input light is transferred into the anomalous dispersion region of the telecom fiber through a cascade of Raman shifts. A recently proposed Raman laser architecture with distributed feedback efficiently performs these Raman conversions. A spectrum spanning over 1000nm(>1 octave) from 880-1900nm is demonstrated. The average power from the supercontinuum is ~34W with a high conversion efficiency …
We propose and optimize theoretically a supercontinuum (SC) laser source in the mid-IR based on using As-Se-Te/As-S core/clad step-index fibers and a femtosecond all-fiber laser system at 2 μm. Numerically simulated spectra extending from ~1 μm to more than 8 μm are demonstrated for pump energy of order 100 pJ in a fiber with a core diameter of 2 μm. To the best of our knowledge, the possibility of such long-wavelength spectral conversion of pump pulses at the wavelength of 2 μm in optical fibers is demonstrated for the first time. The theoretical calculations are performed on the base of real…
In this paper, we report the design and fabrication of a highly birefringent polarization-maintaining photonic crystal fiber (PM-PCF) made from chalcogenide glass, and its application to linearly-polarized supercontinuum (SC) generation in the mid-infrared region. The PM fiber was drawn using the casting method from As38Se62 glass which features a transmission window from 2 to 10 $μm$ and a high nonlinear index of 1.13.10$^{-17}$m$^{2}$W$^{-1}$. It has a zero-dispersion wavelength around 4.5 $μm$ and, at this wavelength, a large birefringence of 6.10$^{-4}$ and consequently strong polarization…
We experimentally demonstrate spatial beam self-cleaning and supercontinuum generation in a tapered Ytterbium-doped multimode optical fiber with parabolic core refractive index and doping profile when 1064 nm pulsed beams propagate from wider (120 micrometers) into smaller (40 micrometers) diameter. In the passive mode, increasing the input beam peak power above 20 kW leads to a bell-shaped output beam profile. In the active configuration, gain from the pump laser diode permits to combine beam self-cleaning with supercontinuum generation between 520-2600 nm. By taper cut-back, we observed that…
Supercontinuum generation in the vacuum ultraviolet through dispersive-wave and soliton-plasma interaction in noble-gas-filled hollow-core photonic crystal fiber
Ultrafast broadband ultraviolet radiation is of importance in spectroscopy and photochemistry, since high photon energies enable single-photon excitations and ultrashort pulses allow time-resolved studies. Here we report the use of gas-filled hollow-core photonic crystal fibers (HC-PCFs) for efficient ultrafast nonlinear optics in the ultraviolet. Soliton self-compression of 400 nm pulses of (unprecedentedly low) ~500 nJ energies down to sub-6-fs durations is achieved, as well as resonant emission of tunable dispersive waves from these solitons. In addition, we discuss the generation of a flat…
The generation of a two-octave supercontinuum from the visible to mid-infrared (700 - 2800 nm) in a non-silica graded-index multimode fiber is reported. The fiber design is based on a nanostructured core comprised of two types of drawn lead-bismuth-gallate glass rods with different refractive indices. This structure yields an effective parabolic index profile, an extended transmission window, and ten times increased nonlinearity when compared to silica fibers. Using femtosecond pulse pumping at wavelengths in both normal and anomalous dispersion regimes, a detailed study is carried out into th…
In this Letter, we show theoretically that the nonlinear photoionisation process of a noble gas inside a hollow-core photonic crystal fibre can be exploited in obtaining broadband supercontinuum generation via pumping close to the mid-infrared regime. The interplay between the Kerr and photoionisation nonlinearities is strongly enhanced in this regime. Photoionisation continuously modifies the medium dispersion, in which the refractive index starts to significantly decrease and approach the epsilon-near-zero regime. Subsequently, the self-phase modulation induced by the Kerr effect is boosted …
Directly accessing the middle infrared, the molecular functional group spectral region, via supercontinuum generation processes based on turn-key fiber lasers offers the undeniable advantage of simplicity and robustness. Recently, the assessment of the coherence of the mid-IR dispersive wave in silicon nitride waveguides, pumped at telecom wavelength, established an important first step towards mid-IR frequency comb generation based on such compact systems. Yet, the spectral reach and efficiency still fall short for practical implementation. Here, we experimentally demonstrate for the first ti…
Residual pump peak in fiber-based supercontinuum, as a general phenomenon, limits its practical application. We report a novel supercontinuum generation (SCG) in a conventional highly nonlinear fiber (HNLF) through multiple coherent pump technique, which eliminates the residual pump peak existed in conventional SCG. The multiple coherent pump technique is realized by double bound-state solitons achieved from a homemade modelocked fiber laser. We further compare the SCGs pumped by conventional bound-state soliton and single soliton. It confirms that the effective elimination of the residual pum…
Improved long-wavelength transmission and supercontinuum (SC) generation is demonstrated by anti-reflective (AR) nanoimprinting and tapering of chalcogenide photonic crystal fibers (PCF). Using a SC source input spanning from 1-4.2 μm, the total transmission of a 15 μm core diameter PCF was improved from ~53 % to ~74 % by nanoimprinting of AR structures on both input- and output facets of the fiber. Through a combined effect of reduced reflection and red-shifting of the spectrum to 5 μm, the relative transmission of light >3.5 μm in the same fiber was increased by 60.2 %. Further extension of …
In this paper, ultra-broad band optical signal amplification are analyzed and demonstrated by utilizing supercontinuum generation propagating over the photonic crystal fiber. The coupled nonlinear Schroodinger equation containing parametric process and stimulated Raman scattering effect was analyzed and solved to calculate the variation of signal gain with frequency. The dependence of the gain spectra on nonlinear and chromatic dispersion coefficients as well as the geometrical parameters of photonic crystal fiber are discussed. The results show that when using a pump at wavelength 1450nm and …
The physics and applications of fiber-based supercontinuum (SC) sources have been a subject of intense interest over the last decade, with significant impact on both basic science and industry. New uses for SC sources are also constantly emerging due to their unique properties that combine high brightness, multi-octave frequency bandwidth, fiber delivery, and single-mode output. The last few years have seen significant research efforts focused on extending the wavelength coverage of SC sources towards the 2 to 20 $μ$m molecular fingerprint mid-infrared (MIR) region and in the ultraviolet (UV) …
Intensity fluctuations in supercontinuum generation are studied in polarization-maintaining (PM) and non-PM all-normal dispersion tellurite photonic crystal fibers. Dispersive Fourier transformation is used to resolve the shot-to-shot spectra generated using 225 fs pump pulses at 1.55 μm, with experimental results well reproduced by vector and scalar numerical simulations. By comparing the relative intensity noise for the PM and non-PM cases, supported by simulations, we demonstrate the advantage of the polarization-maintaining property of the PM fibers in preserving low-noise dynamics. We ass…
Frequency combs with mode spacing in the range of 10 to 20 gigahertz (GHz) are critical for increasingly important applications such as astronomical spectrograph calibration, high-speed dual-comb spectroscopy, and low-noise microwave generation. While electro-optic modulators and microresonators can provide narrowband comb sources at this repetition rate, a significant remaining challenge is a means to produce pulses with sufficient peak power to initiate nonlinear supercontinuum generation spanning hundreds of terahertz (THz) as required for self-referencing in these applications. Here, we pr…
We present experimental and numerical data on the supercontinuum generation in an optical fiber pumped in the normal dispersion range where the seeded dark and the spontaneously generated bright solitons contribute to the spectral broadening. We report the dispersive radiation arising from the interaction of the bright and dark solitons. This radiation consists of the two weak dispersing pulses that continuously shift their frequencies and shape the short and long wavelength wings of the supercontinuum spectrum.
Supercontinuum (SC) generation via femtosecond (fs) pumping in all-normal-dispersion (ANDi) fiber is predicted to offer completely coherent broadening mechanisms, potentially allowing for substantially reduced noise levels in comparison to those obtained when operating in the anomalous dispersion regime. However, previous studies of SC noise typically treat only the quantum noise, typically in the form of one-photon-per-mode noise, and do not consider other technical noise contributions, such as the stability of the pump laser, which become important when the broadening mechanism itself is coh…
We investigate supercontinuum generation in several suspended-core soft-glass photonic crystal fibers pumped by an optical parametric oscillator tunable around 1550 nm. The fibers were drawn from lead-bismuth-gallium-cadmium-oxide glass (PBG-81) with a wide transmission window from 0.5-2.7 micron and a high nonlinear refractive index up to 4.3.10^(-19) m^2/W. They have been specifically designed with a microscale suspended hexagonal core for efficient supercontinuum generation around 1550 nm. We experimentally demonstrate two supercontinuum spectra spanning from 1.07-2.31 micron and 0.89-2.46 …
Ultrafast supercontinuum generation in gas-filled waveguides is one enabling technology for many intriguing application ranging from attosecond metrology towards biophotonics, with the amount of spectral broadening crucially depending on the pulse dispersion of the propagating mode. Here we show that the structural resonances in gas-filled anti-resonant hollow core optical fiber provide an additional degree of freedom in dispersion engineering, allowing for the generation of more than three octaves of broadband light ranging deep UV wavelength towards the near infrared.Our observation relies o…
Deep-UV (DUV) supercontinuum (SC) sources based on gas-filled hollow-core fibers constitute perhaps the most viable solution towards ultrafast, compact, and tunable lasers in the UV spectral region. Noise and spectral stability of such broadband sources are key parameters that define their true potential and suitability towards real-world applications. In order to investigate the spectral stability and noise levels in these fiber-based DUV sources, we generate an SC spectrum that extends from 180 nm (through phase-matched dispersive waves - DWs) to 4 μm by pumping an argon-filled hollow-core a…
When an ultrafast optical pulse with high intensity is propagating through transparent material a supercontinuum can be coherently generated by self-phase modulation, which is essential to many photonic applications in fibers and integrated waveguides. However, the presence of dispersion causes stagnation of spectral broadening past a certain propagation length, requiring an increased input peak power for further broadening. We present a concept to drive supercontinuum generation with significantly lower input power by counteracting spectral stagnation via alternating the sign of group velocit…
