Wavelength and pulse width tunable 1 μm Yb-doped programmable fiber laser

In this paper, an Yb programmable laser in which both the wavelength and the pulse width can be tuned independently is presented. Wavelengths are tuned from 1020 to 1080 nm and repetition rates of pulse trains are set at ≈76 MHz. Pulse width from the oscillator is 26 ps and the shortest pulse after compression is 4 ps. Time average power after an Yb preamplifier is more than 60 mW. It is believed that it is also feasible to obtain less than 1 ps pulse duration out of this laser if an optical filter with larger FWHM is used. It is also notable that fast wavelength sweep can be achieved while keeping pulse width tunability by removing the tunable filter altogether.