Abstract
We describe a near-IR two-stage noncollinear optical parametric amplifier (NOPA) pumped at 800 nm that employs bulk congruent lithium niobate [ (c-LNB)] and bulk potassium niobate [ (KNB)] crystals. Noncollinear phase matching in these materials allows for generation of pulses as broad as () centered in the near-IR at . In the particular geometry described here, the LNB crystal amplifies the white-light seed continuum, and the KNB crystal further amplifies the broadband near-IR pulses. Use of pulse-front matching at both nonlinear optical crystals allows for improvement of the spatiotemporal profile of the amplified ultrabroadband signal pulses and their compression to . Because of the relatively high nonlinear coefficients of these crystals, we achieve overall amplification efficiencies in two consecutive NOPA stages.
© 2013 Optical Society of America
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