Bismuth oxide nanoflakes for passive Q-switching in a C-band erbium doped fiber laser

In this work, bismuth oxide (Bi2O3) nanoflakes suspended in a polyvinyl alcohol (PVA) host are used as a saturable absorber (SA) in an erbium-doped fiber laser (EDFL). The facile hydrothermal method is employed to synthesize the Bi2O3 nanoflakes as the SA, which provides stable Q-switching at a cent...

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Bibliographic Details
Main Authors: Ahmad, Harith, Aidit, Siti Nabila, Yusoff, Norazriena
Format: Article
Published: Elsevier 2018
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Online Access:http://eprints.um.edu.my/22686/
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.infrared.2018.10.003
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Summary:In this work, bismuth oxide (Bi2O3) nanoflakes suspended in a polyvinyl alcohol (PVA) host are used as a saturable absorber (SA) in an erbium-doped fiber laser (EDFL). The facile hydrothermal method is employed to synthesize the Bi2O3 nanoflakes as the SA, which provides stable Q-switching at a central wavelength of 1564 nm with a maximum pulse energy of 21.31 nJ. The generated pulses have repetition rates of 28.41–49.51 kHz and pulse widths of 4.9–1.55 µs over the available pump power range. The Bi2O3-PVA based SA also has a high signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) of 51.28 dB, indicating a significantly stable output and demonstrating the high potential of the fabricated Bi2O3-PVA film for practical applications. To the best of the author's knowledge, this is the first report of the use of a Bi2O3-PVA based SA for Q-switching in a C-band EDFL region.