100-kHz, dual-beam OPA delivering high-quality, 5-cycle angular-dispersion-compensated mid-infrared idler pulses at 3.1 μm

We demonstrate a dual-beam infrared optical parametric source featuring a noncollinear KTA booster amplifier and straightforward angular dispersion compensation of the idler beam. Through careful beam and pulse characterization, and high-harmonic generation in a crystalline solid, we show that the corrected idler beam is diffraction-limited, astigmatism-free, and compressible to its transform-limited, 5-cycle pulse duration. Pumped by only 40-mu J pulses at 1.03 mu m, the parametric source delivers 7.8-mu J, 38-fs, 1.53-mu m and 2.3-mu J, 53-fs, CEP-stable, 3.1-mu m pulses at a repetition rate of 100 kHz. The scheme provides a promising mute to scale the pulse energy and average power beyond PPLN- or KTA-based collinear OPA architectures. (C) 2018 Optical Society of America under the terms of the OSA Open Access Publishing Agreement