Demonstration of a homogeneous Yb-doped core fully aperiodic large-pitch fiber laser

The first demonstration of a 40 mu m core homogeneously ytterbium-doped fully aperiodic large-pitch fiber laser, to the best of our knowledge, is reported here. In this concept, the amplification of unwanted high-order modes is prevented by means of an aperiodic inner-cladding structure, while the core and inner-cladding material has a higher refractive index than pure silica. In a laser configuration, up to 252 W of extracted power, together with an optical-to-optical efficiency of 63% with respect to the incident pump power, have been achieved. While an average M-2 of 1.4 was measured, the emitted power becomes temporally unstable when exceeding 95 W, owing to the occurrence of modal instabilities. (C) 2016 Optical Society of America