Fiber Optics Group

Fields of work

• Development fiber optical components
• Fiber characterisation

At present rare-earth doped fiber lasers represent the most efficient high-power laser systems. Continuous-wave and pulsed fiber lasers quickly gain market share in industrial and medical branches. So far traditional markets for solid-state laser sources. With the possibility to splice all optical components fiber based systems can be operated without any adjustable elements and are therefore extremely robust, low-maintenance units. The development of splicing techniques and optical components for the use in novel high-power fiber laser systems has evolved to a new challenging field of scientific work.

In the framework of the cluster of excellence “Quantum Engineering and Space-Time Research“ (QUEST) in Hanover the basis for the development and characterisation of fiber optical components has been established with new technical equipment. Key aspects of present activity are the development of novel fiber combiners for pump light coupling into active fibers and special filters and wavelength-multiplexer for the use in mode-locked fiber lasers. Fusion-techniques established for single-mode fibers in telecom applications are transferred to fibers with larger core and cladding diameters and photonic crystal fibers (PCF) for high-power signal delivery. Equipment for the analysis of attenuation, mode-field diameter, refractive index profiles and dispersion provides a complete characterisation for the fiber optical components.