Time-domain jitter measurement of ultrafast lasers

Summary form only given. The recent development of ultra low-noise mode-locked fiber lasers with nearly quantum-limited timing jitter promises great advancements in the realm of high-precision measurement systems employing femtosecond lasers. However, as lasers with lower and lower timing jitter are being developed, there is clearly a need for methods that can measure the timing jitter more accurately. Traditional methods using RF spectrum analyzers give only the RF power spectrum of the jitter and are of limited accuracy. Here, we demonstrate a time-domain method that gives very high temporal resolution and a direct time representation of the jitter. The method presented here is also more accurate than previous time-domain jitter measurements that require deconvolution.