Generation of dark solitons in erbium-doped fiber lasers based Sb2Te3 saturable absorbers

Dark solitons, which have better stability in the presence of noise, have potential applications in optical communication and ultrafast optics. In this paper, the dark soliton formation in erbium-doped fiber lasers based Sb2Te3 saturable absorber (SA) is first experimentally demonstrated. The Sb2Te3 SA is fabricated by using the pulsed laser deposition method. The generated dark solitons are centered at the wavelength of 1530 nm and repetition rate of 94 MHz. Analytic solutions for dark solitons are also obtained theoretically. (C)2015 Optical Society of America