Abstract
We extend the technique of difference-frequency mixing of broadband chirped near-infrared (IR) pulses to longer wavelengths, thereby generating high-energy, bandwidth-tunable laser pulses in the mid-IR spectral region. Numerical modeling has been performed to examine the influence of pump and seed chirp on the generated idler bandwidth and pulse duration. The amplifier is realized using zinc-germanium phosphide crystals pumped by a 2 μm ultrafast parametric source. Idler pulses at a center wavelength of 5 μm with adjustable bandwidth are produced by equally chirping the pump and seed pulses using material dispersion. Using this simple approach, efficient generation of narrowband, short, mid-IR laser pulses is achieved without the use of high-loss dispersive gratings or prism pairs.
© 2016 Optical Society of America
Full Article | PDF ArticleMore Like This
Scott Wandel, Ming-Wei Lin, Yanchun Yin, Guibao Xu, and Igor Jovanovic
Opt. Express 24(5) 5287-5299 (2016)
Yanchun Yin, Jie Li, Xiaoming Ren, Yang Wang, Andrew Chew, and Zenghu Chang
Opt. Express 24(22) 24989-24998 (2016)
Qingbin Zhang, Eiji J. Takahashi, Oliver D. Mücke, Peixiang Lu, and Katsumi Midorikawa
Opt. Express 19(8) 7190-7212 (2011)