Study on laser-induced damage of TbBiIG crystal at 1064 nm

With the development of miniaturization of high-energy laser systems, a new Faraday rotator material must be studied to realize the miniaturization and integration of optical isolators. In this paper, high-quality (TbBi)(3)Fe5O12 (TbBiIG) and Ca-doped (TbBi)(3)Fe5O12 (Ca: TbBiIG) single crystal films with hundreds of microns thickness were grown by liquid phase epitaxy method on (111) oriented garnet substrate. The crystal structure, magneto-optical (MO), optical and laser induced damage properties were investigated in detail. We found that the (TbBi)(3)Fe5O12 film has outstanding magneto-optical and laser-induced damage properties. Optical and MO properties indicate that TbBiIG films have a high specific faraday rotation angle of 1452 deg/cm at 1310 nm, and 2812 deg/cm at 1064 nm, absorption coefficient (a) is 5.63 cm(-1) and 15.7 cm(-1) at 1310 nm and 1064 nm, respectively. The laser-induced damage threshold (LIDT) of TbBiIG irradiated by a multi-frequency laser is 8.91 J/cm(2). The light absorption has a significant impact on LIDT value. Rare-earth ion doped iron garnet (RIG) material is a very potential MO material, which can greatly reduce the size and weight of optical isolators in the 1064 nm band. (C) 2022 Optica Publishing Group under the terms of the Optica Open Access Publishing Agreement

Automated summary

In this study, high-quality (TbBi)(3)Fe5O12 and Ca-doped (TbBi)(3)Fe5O12 single crystal films were grown by liquid phase epitaxy method. The crystal structure, magneto-optical, optical, and laser-induced damage properties were investigated. The (TbBi)(3)Fe5O12 film showed excellent magneto-optical and laser-induced damage properties, making it suitable for miniaturization of optical isolators.