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Cu2Te-PVA as saturable absorber for generating Q-switched erbium-doped fiber laser

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Abstract

A passively Q-switched erbium-doped fiber laser (EDFL) using copper telluride-polyvinyl alcohol (Cu2Te-PVA) thin film as saturable absorber (SA) was proposed and demonstrated. The generated Q-switched pulses could be tuned over a tuning range of 44 nm from 1530 to 1574 nm, with the addition of a tunable bandpass filter into the C-band laser cavity. The pump power of 130.1 to 221.0 mW was used to observe the output pulses, which had repetition rates from 51.3 to 61.7 kHz, with a minimum pulse width of around 1.84 µs and highest pulse energy of 7 nJ. The generated pulses were stable with a constant signal to noise ratio value of around 51 dB when tested under continuous operation over a period of 60 min. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first demonstration of Q-switched pulses induced by a Cu2Te-PVA based SA in an EDFL.

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Funding

This work was supported by the University of Malaya (Grant Numbers RK 021-2019, TOP100PRC and RU002-2020) and the Ministry of Higher Education, Malaysia (Grant Number HiCoE Phase II Funding).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Photonics Research Centre, University of Malaya, 50603, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia

    Harith Ahmad, Nur Fatini Azmy, Siti Aisyah Reduan & Norazriena Yusoff

  2. Physics Department, Faculty of Science, University of Malaya, 50603, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia

    Harith Ahmad

  3. Physics Department, Kulliyyah of Science, International Islamic University Malaysia, 25200, Kuantan, Malaysia

    Zamzuri Abdul Kadir

  4. Department of Physics, Faculty of Science and Technology, Airlangga University, Campus C, Jl., Mulyorejo, Surabaya, 60115, Indonesia

    Harith Ahmad

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  1. Harith Ahmad
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Ahmad, H., Azmy, N.F., Reduan, S.A. et al. Cu2Te-PVA as saturable absorber for generating Q-switched erbium-doped fiber laser. Opt Quant Electron 53, 189 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11082-021-02815-0

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