Large-mode-area Soliton Fiber Oscillator Mode-locked with Linear Self-stabilized Interferometer

TL;DR

This paper demonstrates a high-energy, stable soliton fiber oscillator using large-mode-area fibers and a Kerr-type interferometer, achieving significantly increased pulse energy and reduced noise compared to standard fibers.

Contribution

It introduces a novel approach combining large-mode-area fibers with a self-stabilized interferometer for stable, high-energy mode-locking in fiber oscillators.

Findings

Pulse energy increased by a factor of 36

Achieved 170 mW average power and ~10 nJ pulse energy

Reduced high-frequency intensity noise

Abstract

In this work, we investigate an approach to scale up the output pulse energy in an all polarization-maintaining 17 MHz Yb-doped fiber oscillator via implementation of 25 um core-diameter large-mode-area fibers. The artificial saturable absorber in form of a Kerr-type self-stabilized fiber-interferometer enables highly stable mode-locked steady-states in the soliton-like operation regime with 170 mW average output power and a total output pulse energy of ~10 nJ distributed between two output ports. An experimental parameter comparison with a reference oscillator made of 5.5 um core-sized standard fiber-components reveals an increase of pulse energy by a factor of 36 with simultaneously reduced intensity-noise in the high frequency range > 100 kHz.