Compact and efficient subharmonic OPOs for optical frequency comb applications
Abstract/Contents
- Abstract
- Optical frequency combs have become useful for applications in the mid-infrared such as frequency metrology and molecular spectroscopy. One tool for converting the infrared (IR) spectrum to the mid-infrared is the optical parametric oscillator (OPO). Specifically, the OPO operating at degeneracy, or the subharmonic of the pump, has been shown to preserve the salient frequency comb properties of the pump during the nonlinear conversion process. Previous demonstrations of subharmonic OPOs have generated broad bandwidths with low threshold requirements, however conversion efficiencies have been limited. Additionally, because femtosecond OPOs operating at degeneracy are generally synchronously pumped systems, the cavity lengths are typically constrained by the repetition rate of the pump laser. This dissertation presents the experimental results of three novel methods for implementing a synchronously pumped subharmonic OPO. The three designs are built around similar ring-resonator cavities. The designs focus on (i) increasing the OPO conversion efficiency to > 60%; (ii) reducing the overall size, or footprint, of the OPO using an optical fiber cavity while preserving < 100 fs operation; and (iii) increasing the repetition rate while also reducing the footprint of the OPO. First, a synchronously pumped subharmonic OPO was designed around a doubly resonant cavity. The nonlinear gain medium was a periodically-poled lithium niobate crystal designed to convert femtosecond pulses from a commercial 1-micron mode-locked fiber laser to 2 microns. Using high output coupling, the subharmonic OPO generated pulses as short as 40 fs with more than 600 mW of average output power and over 70% conversion efficiency. The synchronously pumped subharmonic OPO cavity was redesigned using single-mode optical fiber as a feedback loop in the cavity. Using two-types of optical fiber, exhibiting normal and anomalous dispersion, respectively, the OPO produced sub-100 fs pulses, generated a broad bandwidth, and achieved almost 40% conversion efficiency. The final design of a synchronously pumped subharmonic OPO cavity was built using a fractional length cavity design. A commercial mode-locked fiber laser operating at 100-MHz pumped an OPO cavity that was 1/5 the length of the typical synchronously pumped cavity length and generated a 500-MHz repetition rate signal.
Description
| Type of resource | text |
|---|---|
| Form | electronic; electronic resource; remote |
| Extent | 1 online resource. |
| Publication date | 2015 |
| Issuance | monographic |
| Language | English |
Creators/Contributors
| Associated with | Ingold, Kirk Alyn, Sr |
|---|---|
| Associated with | Stanford University, Department of Electrical Engineering. |
| Primary advisor | Byer, R. L. (Robert L.), 1942- |
| Thesis advisor | Byer, R. L. (Robert L.), 1942- |
| Thesis advisor | Digonnet, Michel J. F |
| Thesis advisor | Miller, D. A. B |
| Advisor | Digonnet, Michel J. F |
| Advisor | Miller, D. A. B |
Subjects
| Genre | Theses |
|---|
Bibliographic information
| Statement of responsibility | Kirk Alyn Ingold Sr. |
|---|---|
| Note | Submitted to the Department of Electrical Engineering. |
| Thesis | Thesis (Ph.D.)--Stanford University, 2015. |
| Location | electronic resource |
Access conditions
- Copyright
- © 2015 by Kirk Alyn Ingold
- License
- This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial 3.0 Unported license (CC BY-NC).
Also listed in
Loading usage metrics...