Km Labs Inc.

University of Colorado

Kapteyn-Murnane Laboratories, Inc.

Thorlabs Gmbh

Sterling J Backus

Matthew S Kirchner

Henry C Kapteyn

David G Winters

Charles G Durfee

Margaret Mary Murnane

Peter Fendel

Reza Salem

Scott R Domingue

David Winters

Dongfeng Liu

Chenchen Wan

A mid-infrared broadband laser including: a femtosecond laser configured to generate a near-infrared light; nonlinear waveguide configured to broaden and/or shift a spectrum of the light from the femtosecond laser; and a nonlinear medium configured to generate a broadband light by mixing spectral components of the output from the non-linear waveguide. Optionally, at least one dispersion compensation element may be placed between the femtosecond laser and the nonlinear waveguide and/or between the nonlinear waveguide and the nonlinear medium.

Mid-infrared broadband laser using cascaded nonlinearities in mid-infrared fiber and nonlinear crystal

Apparatus and methods for generating controllable, narrow-band radiation at short wavelengths, driven by two colors injected into a structured waveguide. The use of multicolor excitation with the structured waveguide allows the use of very small guided beam diameters, without damaging the waveguide. Reduced guided wave mode area combined with low intensities required to drive wave-mixing frequency conversion allow the use of very compact, high average power, moderate peak intensity femtosecond fiber laser technology to drive useful conversion efficiency of laser light into the deep-UV and vacuum-UV at MHz repetition rates.

Two-color wave mixing upconversion in structured waveguides

Apparatus for modelocking a fiber laser cavity includes two variable retarder assemblies and a polarizing element. The variable retarder assemblies each have two electronically addressable elements and one fixed element. The first variable retarder assembly prepares a polarization state suitable for NPE modelocking to be launched into the fiber, and the second variable retarder assembly controls the polarization state after exiting the fiber, before being incident on the polarizing element. A control system controls the electronically addressable phase retarders in order to create and modify conditions for modelocking the fiber laser.

Use of electronically controlled polarization elements for the initiation and optimization of laser mode-locking

Direct diode-pumped Ti:sapphire laser amplifiers use fiber-coupled laser diodes as pump beam sources. The pump beam may be polarized or non-polarized. Light at wavelengths below 527 nm may be used in cryogenic configurations. Multiple diode outputs may be polarization or spectrally combined.

Direct diode pumped ti:sapphire lasers and amplifiers

Direct diode pumped Ti:sapphire lasers and amplifiers

An integrated, vertically stacked device includes a laser in an enclosure, a wavelength converter in an enclosure, a mechanical interface for attaching the enclosures and maintaining the laser and wavelength converter in the same plane, and apparatus for directing light from the laser to the wavelength converter within the footprint of the integrated device.

Integrated wavelength conversion and laser source

A system for single pass amplification of dissipative soliton-like seed pulses of 1-20 ps to produce output pulses of 50-200 fs, without requiring a stretcher. Such an amplifier relies on the inherent chirp of the seed pulse out of the oscillator instead of pulse stretching.

Single pass amplification of dissipative soliton-like seed pulses

Apparatus and methods for anisotropic pumping of a Kerr lens modelocked laser. Direct diode laser pumping of an ultrafast Kerr lens modelocked laser oscillator is accomplished. Diode lasers generate severely anisotropic beams, meaning the pump beam has a higher-beam-quality dimension and a lower-beam-quality dimension. By spatially overlap of the pump beam higher-beam-quality dimension and the KLM laser mode, KLM operation is accomplished. Multiple laser diode pump beams are combined in counterpropagating and same-side configurations.

Anisotropic beam pumping of a Kerr lens modelocked laser

A method for optimizing multipass laser amplifier output utilizes a spectral filter in early passes but not in later passes. The pulses shift position slightly for each pass through the amplifier, and the filter is placed such that early passes intersect the filter while later passes bypass it. The filter position may be adjust offline in order to adjust the number of passes in each category. The filter may be optimized for use in a cryogenic amplifier.

Method for optimizing output in ultrashort-pulse multipass laser amplifiers with selective use of a spectral filter

An ultrashort pulse amplifier produces high-power ultrafast laser pulses. Pulses first have net negative (i.e. blue to red) chirp applied, and are then amplified in a laser amplifier. After amplification, the pulses are compressed using propagation through a block of material or other convenient optical system with a positive sign of chromatic dispersion. High-order dispersion correction may also be included.

Downchirped pulse amplification

A laser amplifier system amplifies pulses in a single &ldquo;stage&rdquo; from &tilde;10 joules to more than 10 joules, with average power of 1-10 watts, and beam quality M <2. The laser medium is cooled substantially below room temperature, as a means to improve the optical and thermal characteristics of the medium. This is done with the medium inside a sealed, evacuated or purged cell to avoid moisture or other materials condensing on the surface. A &ldquo;seed&rdquo; pulse from a separate laser is passed through the laser medium, one or more times, in any of a variety of configurations including single-pass, multiple-pass, and regenerative amplifier configurations.

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Erie, CO, United States of America

Sterling J Backus