nLIGHT, Inc.
OPTICAL FIBER DEVICES AND METHODS FOR REDUCING STIMULATED RAMAN SCATTERING (SRS) LIGHT INTENSITY IN SIGNAL COMBINED SYSTEMS

Abstract:

Signal combined optical fiber devices, systems, and methods for reducing signal spectrum pumping of Raman spectrum. Power of a Raman component in an output of a signal combined fiber laser system may be reduced by diversifying peak signal wavelengths across a plurality of signal generation and/or amplification modules that are input into a signal combiner. In some examples, fiber laser oscillators that are to have their output signals combined to reach a desired cumulative system output power are tuned to output signal bands of sufficiently different wavelengths that signal from separate ones of the oscillators do not collectively pump a single Raman band. With the combined signal component comprising different peak signal wavelengths, the Raman component of combined output may have multiple peak wavelengths and significantly lower power than in systems where signals of substantially the same signal peak wavelength are combined.