High-power linearly-polarized supercontinuum generation from few-mode polarization-maintaining photonic crystal fiber

We demonstrate a high-power broadband linearly-polarized supercontinuum (LP-SC) laser source by coupling the output of a polarization-maintaining picosecond master oscillator power amplifier (PM-MOPA) at 1064 nm into a few-mode polarization-maintaining photonic crystal fiber (PM-PCF). The PM-MOPA delivers 150 ps pulses at a high repetition rate of 80 MHz with 120.4 W average output power. The short wavelength band of LP-SC is extended from 580 nm to 480 nm with the aid of intermodal four wave mixing (FWM). The spectrum is finally broadened to 480 -2400 nm with a maximum average power of 77.4 W. To our knowledge, this is the first demonstration of such a high average power LP-SC generated from PM-PCF with a wide spectrum.