title: Suppression of self-pulsing behavior in erbium-doped fiber lasers with a semiconductor optical amplifier.
abstract: We experimentally demonstrate that the stability of cw and mode-locked erbium-doped fiber ring lasers can be improved significantly with a semiconductor optical amplifier (SOA) inside the cavity. The fast saturable gain of the SOA suppresses significantly the self-pulsing that is due to ion pairs in the erbium-doped fiber, which acts as a saturable absorber. A linear stabilization analysis of the laser system agrees with our experimental results.
authors.affiliation: Department of Physics and Photonics Research Center, University of Connecticut, Storrs 06269, USA.
authors.forename: Hongmin
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Chen
authors.forename: Guanghao
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Zhu
authors.forename: Niloy K
authors.initials: NK
authors.lastname: Dutta
authors.forename: Kevin
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Dreyer