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In this work we investigate transverse mode instability (TMI) in the presence of pump intensity noise and a controlled perturbation of the input coupling for a rod-type fiber amplifier using spatially and temporally resolved imaging (ST). We show that inherent pump intensity noise from the power supply can define significant peaks in the resulting TMI spectrum. ST measurements in the transition region of TMI also indicates that the simple picture of TMI being seeded by the combination of a static initial fraction of LP11 and pump or signal intensity noise is not valid for our measurements. Furthermore, we present seeding of TMI by perturbing the input coupling dynamically which allows measurements of the TMI gain as a function of frequency and signal power.

In this work a novel accurate method of measuring beam fluctuations is presented and applied to analyze transverse mode instabilities (TMI). The new measurement, ST-measurement, uses Fourier analysis on data from a high-speed camera to achieve raw spatial information about beam fluctuations. TMI in a 65 μm mode- field-diameter aeroGain-ROD-PM85 fiber is investigated using both the ST- and standard photo detector measurement. A comparison of the two measurements shows the quantitative and qualitative superiority of the new ST-measurement due to the spatial information. Numerical simulations are carried out to support the interpretation of the data.

In this work we investigate transverse mode instability (TMI) in the presence of pump intensity noise and a controlled perturbation of the input coupling for a rod-type fiber amplifier using spatially and temporally resolved imaging (ST). We show that inherent pump intensity noise from the power supply can define significant peaks in the resulting TMI spectrum. ST measurements show that the TMI in the transition region consists of different orientations of LP11. This finding indicates that the simple picture of TMI being seeded by the combination of a static initial fraction of LP11 and pump or signal intensity noise is not valid for our measurements. Furthermore we present seeding of TMI by perturbing the input coupling dynamically. ST measurements of the resulting TMI as a function of perturbation frequency provides quantitative information regarding the frequency response of the non-linear coupling coefficient. Finally, ST measurements of the resulting TMI as a function of signal power shows that the TMI experiences an exponential gain long before visible beam fluctuations appear.

Frequency dynamics of transverse mode instabilities (TMIs) are investigated by testing three 285/100 rod fibers in a single-pass amplifier setup reaching up to ~200W of extracted output power without beam instabilities. The pump power is increased well above the TMI threshold to uncover output dynamics, and allowing a simple method for determining TMI threshold based on standard deviation. The TMI frequency component is seen to appear on top of system noise that may trigger the onset. A decay of TMI threshold with test number is identified, but the threshold is fully recovered between testing to the level of the pristine fiber by thermal annealing the fiber output end to 300°C for 2 h.

Photonic crystal fibres (PCFs) emerged as a research topic in the mid 1990'ies [1]. Today, 15 years later, these fibres are increasing deployed in various commercial markets. Here, we will address three of these markets; medical imaging, materials processing and sensors. We will describe how the PCFs provide radical improvements and illustrate the strong diversity in the evolution of PCFs to serve these different markets.

We demonstrate an all-fiber 7x1 signal combiner for incoherent laser beam combining. This is a potential key component for reaching several kW of stabile laser output power. The combiner couples the output from 7 single-mode (SM) fiber lasers into a single multi-mode (MM) fiber. The input signal fibers have a core diameter of 17 μm and the output MM fiber has a core diameter of 100 μm. In a tapered section light gradually leaks out of the SM fibers and is captured by a surrounding fluorine-doped cladding. The combiner is tested up to 2.5 kW of combined output power and only a minor increase in device temperature is observed. At an intermediate power level of 600 W a beam parameter product (BPP) of 2.22 mm x mrad is measured, corresponding to an M2 value of 6.5. These values are approaching the theoretical limit dictated by brightness conservation.

High-power fiber lasers and amplifiers have gained tremendous momentum in the last 5 years. Many of the traditional manufacturers of gas and solid-state lasers are now pursuing the fiber-based systems, which are displacing the conventional technology in many areas. High-power fiber laser systems require reliable fibers with large cores, stable mode quality, and good power handling capabilities-requirements that are all met by the airclad fiber technology. In the present paper we go through many of the building blocks needed to build high-power systems and we show an example of a complete airclad laser system. We present the latest advancements within airclad fiber technology including a new 100 m single-mode polarization-maintaining rod-type fiber capable of amplifying to megawatt power levels. Furthermore, we describe the novel airclad-based pump combiners and their use in a completely monolithic 350 W cw fiber laser system with an M2 of less than 1.1. © 2011 Society of Photo-Optical Instrumentation Engineers (SPIE).

Efficient multi-mode (MM) to single-mode (SM) conversion in a 61 port splitter or “Photonic Lantern” is demonstrated. The coupling loss from a 100 µm core diameter MM section to an ensemble of 61 SM fibers and back to another 100 µm core MM section is measured to be as low as 0.76 dB. This demonstration shows the feasibility of using the Photonic Lanterns within the field of astrophotonics for coupling MM star-light to an ensemble of SM fibers in order to perform fiber Bragg grating based spectral filtering."