Femtosecond laser-written lithium niobate waveguide laser operating at 1085 nm

We report on the channel waveguide lasers at 1085 nm in femtosecond laser written Type II waveguides in an Nd: MgO: LiNbO3 crystal. The waveguide was constructed in a typical dual-line approach. In the geometry, we found that four vicinal regions of the track pair could guide light propagation. In addition, these guiding cores support polarization-dependent-guided modes. The propagation losses of the waveguides were measured to be as low as 1 dB/cm. Under an optical pump at 808 nm, the continuous-wave waveguide lasing at 1085 nm was generated, reaching a slope efficiency of 27% and maximum output power of 8 mW. The lasing threshold was 71 mW. Our results show that with the femtosecond laser written Nd: MgO: LiNbO3 waveguide as the miniature light source, it was possible to construct all-LiNbO3-based integrated devices for diverse photonic applications. (C) 2014 Society of Photo-Optical Instrumentation Engineers (SPIE)