High peak power gigahertz Yb:CALGO laser

We present a high-power gigahertz SESAM modelocked Yb:CALGO laser with sub-60-fs pulses. The laser delivers an average output power of 2.95 W at a pulse repetition rate of 1.8 GHz in fundamental modelocking without additional pulse compression or amplification. Stable modelocking with a single pulse per cavity round-trip is confirmed and results in an output peak power of 24.3 kW and a pulse energy of 1.64 nJ. The laser is pumped by a commercial multimode diode laser, which improves the reliability and robustness. This high-power gigahertz laser is expected to enable numerous applications in frequency metrology. (C) 2014 Optical Society of America