Abstract

We investigated the impact of the recovery time of a saturable absorber (SA) on the mode-locking performance of a fiber laser. This study was conducted for two types of fiber cavities with different net cavity group velocity dispersion (GVD) at a wavelength of 1.55 μm: normal and anomalous. The impact of modulation depth variation was also analyzed. It was found that the recovery time of the SA has little influence on the output pulse characteristics in the case of the anomalous net cavity GVD due to an interplay between saturable absorption-induced pulse shaping and modulation instability-induced soliton evolution, irrespective of the SA operating in the fast or slow saturable absorption regime. However, the recovery time was found to have a significant impact on the output pulse characteristics for the case of a normal net cavity GVD. An SA operating in the fast saturable absorption regime produces mode-locked pulses with symmetric temporal shapes for the normal GVD cavity, whereas asymmetric pulses are generated in the slow saturable absorption regime. From the simulation results, the optimum recovery time range for fiber laser mode-locking is discussed.

Investigation into the impact of the recovery time of a saturable absorber for stable dissipative soliton generation in Yb-doped fiber lasers

Jinho Lee, Suhyoung Kwon, Luming Zhao, and Ju Han Lee
Opt. Express 29(14) 21978-21991 (2021)

Numerical study on the minimum modulation depth of a saturable absorber for stable fiber laser mode locking

Jinwoo Jeon, Junsu Lee, and Ju Han Lee
J. Opt. Soc. Am. B 32(1) 31-37 (2015)

Investigation on pulse shaping in fiber laser hybrid mode-locked by Sb₂Te₃ saturable absorber

Jakub Bogusławski, Grzegorz Soboń, Rafał Zybała, Krzysztof Mars, Andrzej Mikuła, Krzysztof M. Abramski, and Jarosław Sotor
Opt. Express 23(22) 29014-29023 (2015)

Graphene/WS₂ heterostructure saturable absorbers for ultrashort pulse generation in L-band passively mode-locked fiber lasers

Wenxiong Du, Heping Li, Changyong Lan, Chun Li, Junwen Li, Zhuang Wang, and Yong Liu
Opt. Express 28(8) 11514-11523 (2020)

Femtosecond harmonic mode-locking of a fiber laser at 3.27 GHz using a bulk-like, MoSe₂-based saturable absorber

Joonhoi Koo, June Park, Junsu Lee, Young Min Jhon, and Ju Han Lee
Opt. Express 24(10) 10575-10589 (2016)