Versatile and widely tunable mid-infrared erbium doped ZBLAN fiber laser

TL;DR

This paper presents a versatile erbium-doped ZBLAN fiber laser emitting at 3.5 μm with tunability over 450 nm, achieving the longest room-temperature fiber laser emission at 3.78 μm, and demonstrating high power output.

Contribution

It introduces a widely tunable mid-infrared fiber laser with record emission wavelength and power, utilizing simple optical feedback and dual wavelength pumping techniques.

Findings

Achieved 1.45 W power at 3.47 μm

Extended emission wavelength to 3.78 μm, longest at room temperature

Demonstrated tunability across 450 nm

Abstract

We report on a long wavelength emitting rare earth doped fiber laser with emission centered at 3.5 {\mu}m and tunable across 450 nm. The longest wavelength emission was 3.78 {\mu}m, which is the longest emission from a fiber laser operating at room temperature. In a simple optical arrangement employing dielectric mirrors for feedback, the laser was capable of emitting 1.45 W of near diffraction limited output power at 3.47 {\mu}m. These emission characteristics compliment the emission from quantum cascade lasers and demonstrate how all infrared dual wavelength pumping can be used to access high lying rare earth ion transitions that have previously relied on visible wavelength pumping.