Preform fabrication and fiber drawing of 300 nm broadband Cr-doped fibers

The fabrication of a Cr-doped fiber using a drawing- tower method with Cr:YAG as the core of the preform is presented. The Cr-doped YAG preform was fabricated by a rod-in-tube method. By employing a negative pressure control in drawing-tower technique on the YAG preform, the Cr- doped fibers with a better core circularity and uniformity, and good interface between core and cladding were fabricated. The amplified spontaneous emission spectrum showed a broadband emission of 1.2 to 1.6 mu m with the output power density about a few nW/nm. The results indicate that this new Cr-doped fiber may be used as a broadband fiber amplifier to cover the bandwidths in the whole 1.3-1.6 mu m range of low-loss and lowdispersion windows of silica fibers. (C) 2007 Optical Society of America.