Efficient spectral broadening in the 100-W average power regime using gas-filled kagome HC-PCF and pulse compression

We present nonlinear pulse compression of a high-power SESAM-modelocked thin-disk laser (TDL) using an Ar-filled hypocycloid-core kagome hollow-core photonic crystal fiber (HC-PCF). The output of the modelocked Yb: YAG TDL with 127 W average power, a pulse repetition rate of 7 MHz, and a pulse duration of 740 fs was spectrally broadened 16-fold while propagating in a kagome HC-PCF containing 13 bar of static argon gas. Subsequent compression tests performed using 8.4% of the full available power resulted in a pulse duration as short as 88 fs using the spectrally broadened output from the fiber. Compressing the full transmitted power through the fiber (118 W) could lead to a compressed output of > 100 W of average power and > 100 MW of peak power with an average power compression efficiency of 88%. This simple laser system with only one ultrafast laser oscillator and a simple single-pass fiber pulse compressor, generating both high peak power > 100 MW and sub-100-fs pulses at megahertz repetition rate, is very interesting for many applications such as high harmonic generation and attosecond science with improved signal-to-noise performance. (C) 2014 Optical Society of America