We experimentally investigate the impact of the modal content of the seed beam on the Transverse Mode Instability (TMI) threshold in high-power fiber amplifiers. Theoretical models have predicted that the TMI threshold should decrease with Higher-Order Mode (HOM) content in the seed. However no systematic experiment has been done so far to probe such a statement. In this work we have built a system comprising a spatial mode multiplexer that allows manipulating the power content of the Fundamental Mode (FM) and the HOM in the seed beam. Such beams, with the same power but different modal contents, were coupled into a multimode active rod-type fiber and the evolution of the TMI threshold was studied.
We study a phenomenon related to TMI in PM fiber amplifiers: polarization instability. Hereby the polarization of the Fundamental Mode (FM) and of the Higher Order Mode (HOM) in a PM fiber fluctuate during TMI, but the HOM shows significantly stronger polarization changes than the FM. In this work, we will explain the reasons for this behavior and also show that these instabilities, or at least the increase of the sensitivity of the polarization of the HOM to external perturbations, occur even below the TMI threshold.
A new approach to experimentally characterize the transverse modes of optical fibers is proposed in this submission. It analyzes a large volume of electric field data captured from the fiber under test and obtains the orthogonal modal base set of the fiber using the singular value decomposition. This procedure is similar to the principle of machine learning in the area of artificial intelligence. The results show a good agreement with the simulated transverse modes. Due to its operating principle, this approach can characterize any fiber regardless of its length and size.
In this work, we predict the existence of static modal energy transfer in polarization-maintaining (PM) fibers. This phenomenon, related to the effect of transverse mode instability (TMI), appears because of the coexistence of two modal interference patterns and two thermally induced index gratings (one of each per polarization axis in the fiber) with slightly different periods. This static energy transfer can be exploited to create an early warning system for TMI in PM fibers. Moreover, this technique can become an invaluable tool to gain further insights into the physics of TMI.
KEYWORDS: Modulation, Phase shifts, Frequency modulation, Fermium, Amplifiers, Photodiodes, Energy transfer, Fiber amplifiers, High power fiber lasers, Bragg cells
Several studies have reported mitigation strategies of transverse mode instability. These are usually based either on reducing the strength of the thermally induced refractive index grating (RIG) and/or the modal interference pattern (MIP) along the fiber amplifier or on manipulating the phase shift between the RIG and the MIP. Here we report that a heat load modulation can be achieved by pulsing the seed and/or the pump in bursts, which induces a positive phase shift. In this way, a beam cleaning is achieved, which improves the performance of the amplifier system by allowing for operation with a diffraction-limited beam profile at an average output power significantly higher than the TMI threshold. The heat load modulation technique delivers a stable beam at an average output power higher than 1.5 times the TMI threshold with an instantaneous intra-burst power of around four times higher than the TMI threshold.
Modal decomposition (MD) techniques are a way to characterize the modal amplitudes and phases of eigenmodes in optical fibers. Some applications such as, e.g., diagnosing/analyzing transverse mode instabilities or monitoring a laser beam during operation, require a high-speed modal decomposition. However, the proposed modal decomposition techniques up to now are seldom able to implement a real-time MD due to their complex post-processing (e.g., most of the numerical computing-based MD). In this work a high-speed, real-time modal decomposition of fiber laser beams is presented. It employs a spatial mode multiplexer (MUX), which is a multipass cavity with multiple single-mode fiber (SMF) inputs and a single few-mode fiber (FMF) output, operated in reverse. Thus, if the output of a fiber laser system is imaged on the end facet of the FMF, then the MUX is used as a demultiplexer and, thus, the modal amplitude information can be obtained by reading out the different SMF input ports. We have carried out several experiments with the MUX and it has been proven that this method is accurate and extremely fast. In fact, it is even able to decompose the beam during a Q-switched pulse emission and produce real-time results.
A new passive mitigation strategy for the effect of transverse mode instability is presented in this work. This technique requires the use of a polarization-maintaining fiber in which light is coupled with a polarization state oriented around 45° with respect to the main polarization axes of the fiber. Since the modal beat length in each of the main polarization axes of the fiber is slightly different, the aforementioned coupling condition leads to the modal interference pattern being periodically washed out. Such a situation at the end leads to a weakening of the thermally-induced refractive index grating and to an increase of the threshold for the effect of transverse mode instability that can amount to ~50%.
A new approach to characterize the effect of transverse mode instability (TMI) in high-power fiber-laser systems is presented. A position-sensitive detector is employed to detect the trajectories of the center of gravity of the fluctuating beam (in a short time-window) at different average power levels. With an increasing average output power, the area covered by the trajectories increases which is used as a measure for the stability of the system. The new concept allows for a simple, fast, and detailed characterization of TMI, which accurately determines its threshold even in complex operating regimes. This new technique can easily distinguish between spatial and power fluctuations of the beam. Furthermore, the trajectories contain information about the movement of the center of gravity of the beam, which can be used to gain additional insight about the dynamics of TMI. The technique robustness was tested by characterizing the TMI behavior in a complex operating regime. e.g., using a pump-power modulation.
Transverse mode instability (TMI) induces detrimental mode coupling in fiber-laser systems at high average powers and still represents the main limitation for the further power scaling of diffraction-limited systems. In this contribution, we describe a new approach to mitigate TMI in fiber amplifiers by dynamically modifying the inversion profile in the fiber. When periodically changing the excitation of the active fiber (e.g. with the help of an acousto-optic deflector), the intensity distribution along the fiber is also dynamically modified. If this is done with a frequency of a few hundreds of kHz (i.e. so that the inversion cannot completely adapt to the new intensity pattern), the inversion grating will be washed out and a homogeneous inversion profile can develop. Consequently, the resulting heat distribution will also be homogenized and the formation of a thermally-induced refractive index grating, which is responsible for the TMI-induced mode coupling, can be largely suppressed. Hence, the presented mitigation approach tackles TMI at an early stage by acting upon the root cause of the detrimental modal energy transfer. At the conference, simulations will be presented which will illustrate the working principle of the new mitigation approach and show its potential to increase the TMI threshold of high-power fiber amplifiers by washing out the inversion profile.
In this work we present a novel way to mitigate the effect of transverse mode instability in high-power fiber amplifiers. In this technique a travelling wave is induced in the modal interference pattern by seeding the amplifier with two modes that have slightly different frequencies. The interference pattern thus formed will travel up- or downstream the fiber (depending on the sign of the frequency difference between the modes) with a certain speed (that depends on the absolute value of the frequency difference). If the travelling speed is chosen properly, the thermally-induced index grating will follow the travelling modal interference pattern creating a constant phase shift between these two elements. Such a constant controllable phase shift allows for a stable energy transfer from the higher-order modes to the fundamental mode or viceversa. Thus, this technique can be adjusted in such a way that, at the output of the fiber almost all the energy is concentrated in the fundamental mode, regardless of the excitation conditions. Moreover, this technique represents one of the first examples of the new family of mitigation strategies acting upon the phase shift between the modal interference pattern and the refractive index grating. Additionally, it even exploits the effect of transverse mode instability for gaining control over the beam profile at the output of the amplifier. Therefore, by adjusting the frequency difference between the seed modes, it is possible to force that the beam at the output acquires the shape of the fundamental mode or that of a higher order mode.
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