Synchronous amplification of subpicosecond pulses

Author

Sizer, Theodore, II ; Kafka, James D. ; Duling, Irl N., III ; Gabel, C.W. ; Mourou, Gerard A.

Author_Institution

AT&T Bell Laboratories, Holmdel, NJ

Volume

19

Issue

4

fYear

1983

fDate

4/1/1983 12:00:00 AM

Firstpage

506

Lastpage

511

Abstract

In high-gain dye amplifiers, the effective storage time of the gain medium is only a few hundred picoseconds. Therefore, efficient amplification of ultrashort pulses places a stringent requirement on the synchronization between the pump pulse and the pulse to be amplified. We present a technique of short pulse generation using a dye laser synchronously pumped by a frequency-doubled CW mode locked Nd:YAG laser. Pulses as short as 70 fs are produced. The short optical pulses are subsequently amplified with two different synchronous amplification schemes using 100 ps pulses to establish the gain in the dye amplifier stages. Subpicosecond pulses with energies from a few hundred nanojoules at 500 Hz to a few hundred microjoules at 7 Hz can be obtained.

Keywords

Dye lasers; Laser amplifiers; Pulsed lasers; Frequency synchronization; Laser excitation; Laser mode locking; Optical amplifiers; Optical pulse generation; Optical pulses; Pulse amplifiers; Pump lasers; Semiconductor optical amplifiers; Synchronous generators;

fLanguage

English

Journal_Title

Quantum Electronics, IEEE Journal of

Publisher

ieee

ISSN

0018-9197

Type

jour

DOI

10.1109/JQE.1983.1071897

Filename

1071897