Abstract

We demonstrate an extremely simple and compact diode-pumped mode-locked Cr:LiSAF laser (Fig. 1) generating 160 fs pulses (Fig. 2) at 25 mW average output power. Both saturable absorption and negative group velocity dispersion (GVD) are combined in one element, the dispersive saturable absorber mirror (D-SAM) (Fig. 3), which generates femtosecond pulses by simply replacing one end mirror of a standard Δ-cavity (Fig. 1) without the need of any further dispersion compensation such as a prism pair. This is the first time dispersion compensation and saturable absorber have been combined within one element. In this case we use a 30 nm thick Al_0.06Ga_0.94 As bulk saturable absorber integrated inside a semiconductor Gires-Tournois [1] structure. This can be extended to other dispersion compensation techniques such as a chirped mirror [2].

© 1995 Optical Society of America