Ultrafast optical parametric oscillator pumped by a vertical external-cavity surface-emitting laser (VECSEL)

Ultrafast, optically pumped, passively modelocked vertical external -cavity surface-emitting lasers (VECSELs) are excellent sources for industrial and scientific applications that benefit from compact semiconductor based high -power ultrafast lasers with gigahertz repetition rates and excellent beam quality. Applications such as self-referenced frequency combs and multi -photon imaging require sub -200-fs pulse duration combined with high pulse peak power. Here, we present a semiconductor saturable absorber mirror (SESAM) modelocked VECSEL with a pulse duration of 1 47 fs and 328 W of pulse peak power. The average output power was 100 mW with a repetition rate of 1.8 2 GHz at a cent er wavelength of 103 4 nm. The laser has optimal beam quality operating in a fundamental transverse mode with a M 2 value of <1.05 in both orthogonal directions. The VECSEL was grown by metal -organic vapor phase epitaxy (MOVPE) with five pairs of strain-compensated InGaAs quantum wells (QW s). The QWs are placed symmetrical around the antinodes of the standing electric field at a reduced average field enhancement in the QWs of ! 0.5 (normalized to 4 outside the structure). The modelocking results overcome the trade -off between pulse duration and peak power of the state -of-the-art threshold values of 4.3 5 kW peak power for a pulse d uration of 400 fs and 3.3 W peak power for a pulse duration of 107 fs. Keywords: Mode -locked lasers, Semiconductor lasers, Ultrafast lasers, Vertical emitting lasers.

We present the amplification of a mode-locked vertical external-cavity surface-emitting laser (VECSEL) using an Yb:YAG crystalline waveguide as gain medium. The VECSEL seed laser operates at a center wavelength of 1030 nm and generates 300-fs pulses at a repetition rate of 1.77 GHz. An average seed power of 60 mW was launched onto a 8.3 mm long fs-laser written Yb:YAG waveguide pumped by 7.7 W from a 969-nm continuous-wave VECSEL. The amplifier achieves an average output power of up to 2.9 W, corresponding to an amplification factor of 17 dB. Due to gain narrowing, the pulse duration increases to 629 fs. Our results show that crystalline waveguides are a promising technique for the realization of compact multi-watt ultrafast amplifier systems.

We present a genetic algorithm based method to optimize the gain medium design of a passively mode-locked vertical external-cavity surface-emitting laser (VECSEL) for ultrashort pulse generation. Beginning with a given standard VECSEL design, we show that a simple modification to the DBR within the active mirror can significantly reduce both the duration and the chirp of the generated pulse. We demonstrate, using realistic numerical simulations, that the full-width at half-maximum of the pulse can be reduced by more than a factor of two. The required design changes come at the cost of increased sensitivity to perturbations in the active chip growth. Methods of counteracting this trend are presented.

During the recent years, the wavelength coverage of optically-pumped vertical external-cavity surface-emitting lasers (VECSELs) has expanded significantly and currently reaches from the UV to mid-IR (although not without gaps). This progress has been fuelled by the ability to tailor the VECSELs emission wavelength via bandgap engineering and by the capability to deploy different kinds of semiconductor gain material systems, such as GaAs, InP, GaSb and PbTe, for example. The combination of wavelength flexibility and efficient intra-cavity second-harmonic generation makes these lasers excellent light sources for many applications for which conventional solid-state laser aren't available. In particular, the development of frequency-doubled VECSELs with blue, green and yellow-orange emission has experienced a surge of outstanding achievements.

We report a passively mode-locked vertical external cavity surface emitting laser (VECSEL) producing 400 fs pulses with 4.35 kW peak power. The average output power was 3.3 W and the VECSEL had a repetition rate of 1.67 GHz at a center wavelength of 1013 nm. A near-antiresonant, substrate-removed, 10 quantum well (QW) gain structure designed to enable femtosecond pulse operation is used. A SESAM which uses fast carrier recombination at the semiconductor surface and the optical Stark effect enables passive mode-locking. When 1 W of the VECSEL output is launched into a 2 m long photonic crystal fiber (PCF) with a 2.2 µm core, a supercontinuum spanning 175 nm, with average power 0.5 W is produced.

We report on a picosecond pulse source delivering near transform-limited pulses in the 1.55 µm wavelength region, based on an optically pumped InP-based mode locked Vertical External Cavity Surface Emitting Laser (VECSEL). The cavity combines two semiconductor elements, a gain structure which includes six strained InGaAlAs quantum wells and a hybrid metal-metamorphic Bragg bottom mirror bonded onto a CVD diamond substrate, and a single quantum well GaInNAs SEmiconductor Saturable Absorber Mirror (SESAM). The laser operates at a repetition frequency of 2 GHz and emits near-transform-limited 1.7 ps pulses with an average output power of 15 mW at room temperature, using 1.7 W pump power at 980 nm. The RF line width of the free running laser has been measured to be less than 1 kHz.

We present our first flip-chip processed, modelocked InGaSb vertical external-cavity surface-emitting laser (VECSEL) in the 2-µm wavelength range. The optically pumped VECSEL is passively modelocked with a semiconductor saturable absorber mirror (SESAM) resulting in 2.7-ps pulses with 89-mW average output power at a center wavelength of 2063 nm and a pulse repetition rate of 1.96 GHz. The standing-wave V-shaped cavity is formed by a 1% output coupler, a VECSEL gain chip as a folding cavity mirror, and a SESAM as the end mirror. An intracavity 1.5-mm silicon plate at Brewster’s angle was used for dispersion compensation and a fixed polarization.

We present a 10GHz passively mode-locked vertical external-cavity surface-emitting semiconductor laser (VECSEL) with 1.4W average output power in 6.1ps pulses. The output features a very good pulse quality with a time–bandwidth product of 0.42 in a nearly diffraction-limited beam. This demonstrates that passively mode-locked VECSELs are suitable for generating high powers in high-repetition-rate pulse trains.

Self-assembled quantum dots (QDs) as active media for ultrafast semiconductor disk laser offer large gain bandwidths, fast gain dynamics, and high temperature stability. We report on the shortest pulses and the highest pulse peak power from an optically pumped vertical external cavity surface emitting laser (VECSEL) based on QDs and optimized for passive modelocking at 1035 nm using a semiconductor saturable absorber mirror. We demonstrate 216-fs pulses with an average output power of 269 mW at a pulse repetition rate of 2.77 GHz and 396 W peak power. At a lower pulse repetition rate of 1.67 GHz, we achieve 193-fs pulses with 112 mW of average output power. We remark a higher optical-to-optical pump efficiency compared to our previous QW VECSELs in the sub-300-fs regime. This is further confirmed by a comparative analysis of the saturation recovery which reveals longer carrier lifetimes for the QD compared to QW VECSELs.

The output characteristics of light in two parametric generation regimes [parametric superluminescence and parametric generation in a singly resonant optical parametric oscillator (OPO) based on a 50-mm long PPLN crystal, synchronously pumped by a 50-ps Nd : YAG laser] are compared. The total average output power at the wavelengths of signal (λ = 1475 nm) and idler (λ = 3820 nm) waves in the superluminescence regime is ∼120 mW (peak power ∼120 kW). The maximum total conversion efficiency with respect to the absorbed power in the superluminescence regime is ∼60%. The maximum conversion efficiency into the idler wave with respect to the absorbed pump power is 15% and 25% (quantum efficiencies of 54% and 90%) for the superluminescence and singly resonant OPO regimes, respectively. The maximum values of the average output power at the idler wavelength are ∼30 and ∼60 mW at degrees of pump depletion of 47% and 55% for the superluminescence and singly resonant OPO regimes, respectively.

We analyze the emergence of wiggling temporal localized states in a passively mode-locked vertical external-cavity surface-emitting laser composed by a gain chip and a resonant saturable absorber mirror. We show that the wiggling instability stems from the interplay between the third-order dispersion induced by the micro-cavities and their frequency mismatch. The latter is identified as an experimentally crucial parameter defining the range of existence of stable emission. We reveal the homoclinic scenario underlying the wiggling phenomenon, and we show how it allows us to control the oscillation parameters.

We present the first modelocked backside-cooled GaSb VECSEL (Vertical External Cavity Surface Emitting Laser) operating above <inline-formula> <tex-math notation="LaTeX">$2 ~\mu \text{m}$ </tex-math></inline-formula>. Using a two quantum well InGaSb SESAM (SEmiconductor Saturable Absorber Mirror) in a V-shaped cavity arrangement we obtain femtosecond modelocking at a center wavelength of 2061 nm, with pulses as short as 324 fs, an average output power as high as 65 mW at a repetition rate of 3 GHz. An operation in a picosecond regime is further demonstrated with an even higher average output power of up to 260 mW and 4.5-ps pulses. We perform a characterization in both the femto- and picosecond regimes with measurements of the pulse duration, the optical spectrum, and the pulse repetition rate (frequency and time domain analysis) at low and high power. In this context, the influence of intracavity group delay dispersion (GDD) is investigated. We find that GDD has a strong influence on the pulse duration (fs or ps regime) and thus on the performance of our SESAM-modelocked 2-<inline-formula> <tex-math notation="LaTeX">$\mu \text{m}$ </tex-math></inline-formula> GaSb VECSEL.

In this study, nanosecond-pulse lasing was achieved using a vertical-external-cavity surface-emitting laser (VECSEL) with only a single gain chip. A simple linear-cavity setup was used for the VECSEL, and pulsed lasing with a pulse width of &amp;#x223C;9 ns and a repetition frequency of &amp;#x223C;54 MHz was achieved. Dual-wavelength lasing at 974 and 978 nm was observed. The average output power during pulsed operation exceeded 100 mW. As the pumping power was increased, the laser output power could be switched off. However, stable dual-wavelength emission was maintained. The maximum output power under dual-wavelength operation could reach 455 mW.

A highly efficient and stable mid-infrared optical parametric oscillator is demonstrated, pumped by an electro-optic Q-switched Er:YAG laser with operating wavelength locked at 1645 nm by a volume Bragg grating. The oscillator, based on MgO-doped periodically poled lithium niobate (MgO:PPLN) crystal, yields a maximum overall average output power in excess of 1 W, corresponding to a conversion efficiency of 35.5% and a slope efficiency of 43.6%. The signal and idler wavelengths of the OPO are around ~2.7 μm and ~4.3 μm, respectively, corresponding to the two peak absorption bands of CO(2). Lasing characteristics of the oscillator, including the time evolution of the pump, signal and idler pulses at different pump power levels, are also investigated. Temperature tuning of the MgO:PPLN crystal gives signal and idler ranges of 2.67 to 2.72 μm and 4.17 to 4.31 μm, respectively.

A technique for actively stabilizing the repetition rate of a mode-locked vertical external-cavity surface-emitting laser is presented using an optically triggered semiconductor saturable absorber mirror. This method enables a significant reduction of the timing jitter measured in the frequency range [100 Hz, 10 MHz] and makes this kind of externally locked laser suitable for high-speed sampling of microwave signals. The experimental demonstration shows jitter reduction by a factor of 16 from 8 ps down to 423 fs for a 1.68-GHz repetition rate pulse train. The hold-in locking bandwidth and stabilization efficiency are shown to be a function of the average power and modulation index of the optical control signal.