title: Alignment-free, all-spliced fiber laser source for CARS microscopy based on four-wave-mixing.
abstract: An environmentally-stable low-repetition rate fiber oscillator is developed to produce narrow-bandwidth pulses with several tens of picoseconds duration. Based on this oscillator an alignment-free all-fiber laser for multi-photon microscopy is realized using in-fiber frequency conversion based on four-wave-mixing. Both pump and Stokes pulses for coherent anti-Stokes Raman scattering (CARS) microscopy are readily available from one fiber end, intrinsically overlapped in space and time, which drastically simplifies the experimental handling for the user. The complete laser setup is mounted on a home-built laser scanning microscope with small footprint. High-quality multimodal microscope images of biological tissue are presented probing the CH-stretching resonance of lipids at an anti-Stokes Raman-shift of 2845 cm(-1) and second-harmonic generation of collagen. Due to its simplicity, compactness, maintenance-free operation, and ease-of-use the presented low-cost laser is an ideal source for bio-medical applications outside laser laboratories and in particular inside clinics.
authors.affiliation: Institute of Applied Physics, Abbe Center of Photonics, Friedrich-Schiller-Universität Jena, Albert-Einstein-Str. 15, 07745 Jena, Germany. martin.baumgartl@uni-jena.de
authors.forename: Martin
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Baumgartl
authors.forename: Thomas
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Gottschall
authors.forename: Javier
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Abreu-Afonso
authors.forename: Antonio
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Díez
authors.forename: Tobias
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Meyer
authors.forename: Benjamin
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Dietzek
authors.forename: Manfred
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Rothhardt
authors.forename: Jürgen
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Popp
authors.forename: Jens
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Limpert
authors.forename: Andreas
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Tünnermann
mesh_terms: D001158:Arteries / Q000473:pathology; D050197:Atherosclerosis / Q000473:pathology; D003460:Crystallization; D006801:Humans; D007834:Lasers; D008055:Lipids / Q000032:analysis; D008853:Microscopy / Q000379:methods*; D017785:Photons; D013059:Spectrum Analysis, Raman / Q000379:methods*
chemical_list: D008055:Lipids