Fabrication and characterization of Tm3+-Ho3+ co-doped tellurite glass microsphere lasers operating at ∼2.1 μm

• Published in: Optical materials 2017-10, Vol.72, p.524-528
• Main Authors: Yang, Zhengsheng, Wu, Yuehao, Yang, Kun, Xu, Peipeng, Zhang, Wei, Dai, Shixun, Xu, Tiefeng
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Co-doped tellurite glass; Microsphere laser; Mid-infrared laser; Thermal sensing
• ISSN: 0925-3467; 1873-1252
• DOI: 10.1016/j.optmat.2017.06.057

We used a Tm3+-Ho3+ co-doped tellurite glass as the laser medium to build active microsphere laser resonators. A droplet method is implemented and hundreds of high quality microspheres can be fabricated simultaneously. Typical Quality factors (Q-factors) of microspheres fabricated in this work reach 106. Silica fiber tapers are used as the coupling mechanism and a commercial 808 nm laser diode is used as the pump source. Laser lines at ∼2.1 μm can be observed in the emission spectrum of these active microsphere resonators. Pump thresholds for generating single mode laser lines in a 59.52 μm diameter microsphere is measured to be 0.887 mW and as the pump power is increased to 1.413 mW, multi-mode laser lines can be generated. We also demonstrate microsphere lasers fabricated in this work can be thermally tuned with a temperature sensitivity of 32 pm/°C, implying these microspheres can be used as highly compact temperature sensors in various mid-infrared applications. •High-Q microspheres are mass-produced using a Tm3+-Ho3+ co-doped tellurite glass.•Single and multi-mode lasers at ∼2.1 μm are excited by a simple 808 nm pump source.•Laser lines can be thermally tuned with a temperature sensitivity of 32 pm/°C.