Abstract

Passively mode - locked fibre Soliton Lasers (PSL) have recently become of considerable interest owing to their ability to produce ultrashort pulses in a simple laser cavity configuration. In addition, a lot of interesting effects are involved in the PSL operation. The mode-locking process in PSL is similar to that of a laser with a fast saturable absorber and is initiated by the most intensive fluctuation of the intracavity energy flow [1]. Another important feature of PSL is the soliton nature of the generated pulses resulting in a well-defined energy of an individual pulse [2]. Typically, PSL generates a few pulses per round-trip period, and the time interval between pulses is a random value as there is no force holding pulses at certain time distance. Nevertheless, under certain circumstancies, the laser output pattern demonstrates stability during several minutes [3].

© 1993 Optical Society of America