Versatile femtosecond optical parametric oscillator frequency combs for metrology

This thesis addresses the development of broadly tunable, high repetition rate frequency combs in the mid-IR region. A novel PPKTP crystal design was used to provide phasematching for parametric oscillation and simultaneously give efficient pump+idler sum-frequency generation (SFG). This innovation enabled a fully stabilized idler comb from a 333-MHz femtosecond optical parametric oscillator to be generated in which the carrier envelope offset frequency fCEO together with the repetition frequency fREP were stabilised. This OPO platform was then extended to demonstrate, via harmonic pumping, a fully stabilized 1-GHz OPO frequency comb from a 333-MHz pump laser. Next, an alternative route to a 1-GHz OPO comb was investigated by synchronously pumping an OPO directly with a 1-GHz Ti:sapphire laser. Here the comb was fully stabilized for the signal, idler and pump pulses by using a narrow linewidth CW diode laser developed for the project and whose design is also presented. A further increase in the comb mode spacing was performed with a Fabry-Pérot cavity. A stabilised cavity was used to filter 1.5 m signal pulses from a 333-MHz repetition rate OPO frequency comb to yield a 10-GHz comb. The length of the Fabry-Pérot cavity was dither locked to a single-frequency ECDL and later on directly to the OPO frequency comb. Finally the 333-MHz OPO comb was demonstrated in an optical frequency metrology experiment. The frequency comb mode number and the absolute frequency of a narrow-linewidth CW laser were measured and the performance of the OPO comb was found to be comparable to that of a commercial fibre laser comb used as a benchmark in the experiment

Rb-87-stabilized 375-MHz Yb:fiber femtosecond frequency comb

We report a fully stabilized 1030-nm Yb-fiber frequency comb operating at a pulse repetition frequency of 375 MHz. The comb spacing was referenced to a Rb-stabilized microwave synthesizer and the comb offset was stabilized by generating a super-continuum containing a coherent component at 780.2 nm which was heterodyned with a 87Rb-stabilized external cavity diode laser to produce a radio-frequency beat used to actuate the carrier-envelope offset frequency of the Yb-fiber laser. The two-sample frequency deviation of the locked comb was 235 kHz for an averaging time of 50 seconds, and the comb remained locked for over 60 minutes with a root mean squared deviation of 236 kHz