Generation of femtosecond pulses from order of magnitude pulse compression in a cw synchronously pumped optical parametric oscillator

Summary form only given. Efficient sources of tunable coherent radiation in the near- and mid-IR, in the femtosecond time domain, are necessary for many applications including spectroscopy and communications. We report on the generation of tunable 200-fs pulses obtained from an optical parametric oscillator (OPO) synchronously pumped by a 4-ps cw mode-locked Nd:YLF source (/spl lambda/=1.047 /spl mu/m). Pulse compression in synchronously pumped OPOs has been previously demonstrated at high powers. We present, what we believe to be, the first demonstration of the extension of this technique to low-power cw mode-locked devices pumped by diode lasers. This is made possible by the use of periodically poled lithium niobate, which provides the required gain for much lower pump powers. The compressed pulses show excellent stability, high conversion efficiency, and peak powers exceeding that of the pump.