Abstract

Broadband short pulse laser sources are subject of growing interest due to their potential in few-cycle pulse generation, femtosecond spectroscopy and frequency-comb generation. For low pulse energies, octave spanning Ti:sapphire oscillators provide the most required features next to an excellent noise behaviour and are well established [1]. However, higher pulse energies would be desirable for many applications and especially for atomic spectroscopy, frequency-combs in the UV-spectral range at high repetition rates are required. Due to the limitations of the Ti:sapphire oscillators in terms of pulse energy, the conversion into the UV spectral range is strongly inefficient. With the recent power scaling of Yb-based high-energy short pulse sources [2], optical parametric oscillators provide an interesting alternative.

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