Self-amplitude and self-phase modulation of the charcoal mode-locked erbium-doped fiber lasers

With the intra-cavity nano-scale charcoal powder based saturable absorber, the 455-fs passive mode-locking of an L-band erbium-doped fiber laser (EDFL) is demonstrated. The size reduction of charcoal nano-particle is implemented with a simple imprinting-exfoliation-wiping method, which assists to increase the transmittance up to 0.91 with corresponding modulation depth of 26%. By detuning the power gain from 17 to 21 dB and cavity dispersion from -0.004 to -0.156 ps(2) of the EDFL, the shortening of mode-locked pulsewidth from picosecond to sub-picosecond by the transformation of the pulse forming mechanism from self-amplitude modulation (SAM) to the combining effect of self-phase modulation (SPM) and group delay dispersion (GDD) is observed. A narrower spectrum with 3-dB linewidth of 1.83-nm is in the SAM case, whereas the spectral linewidth broadens to 5.86 nm with significant Kelly sideband pair can be observed if the EDFL enters into the SPM regime. The mode-locking mechanism transferred from SAM to SPM/GDD dominates the pulse shortening procedure in the EDFL, whereas the intrinsic defects in charcoal nano-particle only affect the pulse formation at initial stage. The minor role of the saturable absorber played in the EDFL cavity with strongest SPM is observed. (C) 2013 Optical Society of America