Carbon nanostructure-based saturable absorber mirror for a diode-pumped 500-MHz femtosecond Yb:KLu(WO4)(2) laser

Abstract

We report a diode-pumped Yb:KLu(WO4)(2) (Yb:KLuW) laser passively mode-locked by employing a carbon nanostructure-based multi-functional saturable absorber mirror. Two types of carbon nanostructures, single-walled carbon nanotubes (SWCNTs) and graphene, were deposited on a single dielectric mirror and applied both for stable mode-locking of the Yb: KLuW laser near 1050 nm in a compact cavity configuration. The carbon nanostructure mode-locked laser delivers 157-fs pulses with output powers of up to 85 mW at a repetition rate of 500 MHz. (C) 2014 Optical Society of America