Picosecond pulse deneration in a Hybrid Q-switched laser source by using a micro-electromechanical mirror

Vincent Couderc (1) , Aurelian Crunteanu (2) , Fabert Marc , Florent Doutre , Farid El Bassri (1) , Dominique Pagnoux (1) , Alain Jalocha (3)

1 XLIM-PHOTONIQUE - PHOTONIQUE
2 XLIM-MINACOM - MINACOM
3 CILAS - Département de Photonique

We present a novel Q-switched laser source using a micro-optical-electromechanical mirror (MOEM) designed for short pulse emission. It is based on a hybrid configuration including a passively Q-switched microchip laser coupled to a fiber cavity closed by a cantilever type MOEM acting as an active modulator. This specially designed mirror with a single reflecting gold membrane is switched by low bias voltage ~50 V (peak to peak). This device emits pulses at tunable repetition rates up to 1.6 kHz, with ~564 ps duration and 3.4 kW peak power, which constitutes the shortest pulse duration ever reported with MOEMs based pulsed lasers.

Vincent Couderc, Aurelian Crunteanu, Fabert Marc, Florent Doutre, Farid El Bassri, et al.. Picosecond pulse deneration in a Hybrid Q-switched laser source by using a micro-electromechanical mirror. Optics Express, 2012, 20 (5), pp.5524-5529. ⟨10.1364/OE.20.005524⟩. ⟨hal-00746631⟩