Towards visible CW pumped supercontinua

TL;DR

This paper demonstrates a visible supercontinuum generated by a 1 um CW pump laser, extending down to 0.65 um, using engineered photonic crystal fiber and nonlinear effects.

Contribution

It introduces a method for generating visible supercontinuum with continuous wave pumping using a specially designed photonic crystal fiber.

Findings

Supercontinuum extends from 0.65 um to beyond 1 um.

Four-wave mixing and dispersive wave trapping are key mechanisms.

High power CW pumping enables broad supercontinuum generation.

Abstract

We report a 1 um continuous wave pumped supercontinuum which extends short of the pump wavelength to 0.65 um. This is achieved by using a 50 W Yb fibre laser in combination with a photonic crystal fibre with a carefully engineered zero dispersion wavelength. We show that the short wavelength generation is due to a combination of four-wave mixing and dispersive wave trapping by solitons. The evolution and limiting factors of the continuum are discussed.