Nickel 1,3,5-benzene-tricarboxylic acid-metal organic framework polymer composite saturable absorber for femtosecond pulse generation.

• Nickel-based metal organic framework (MOF) is used as a nonlinear material. • Nickel-based MOF/polydimethylsiloxane composite is spin-coated on a tapered fiber. • Encapsulation of the composite promotes better protection of tapered fiber waist. • The fabricated laser generates a fundamental soliton with good stability. This work demonstrates the fabrication of a saturable absorber with nickel 1,3,5-benzene-tricarboxylic acid (Ni-H 3 BTC)-metal organic framework (MOF) to generate soliton pulses in an erbium-doped fiber laser. The saturable absorber was fabricated by spin-coating Ni-H 3 BTC-MOF/polydimethylsiloxane composite on a tapered fiber as the encapsulation agent for light-matter interactions. The proposed cavity emitted a pulse laser at 1557.72 nm central wavelength with 3-dB bandwidth of 5.90 nm, pulse width of 907 fs, and average output power of 13.02 mW. At maximum pump power of 247.8 mW, the pulse energy was calculated to be 1.3 nJ at 10 MHz repetition rate. These results might assist as a footing to explore different types of available MOFs and their properties for the generation of ultrashort pulses. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]