Electronic control of nonlinear-polarization-rotation mode locking in Yb-doped fiber lasers

We demonstrate a convenient approach to precisely tune the polarization state of a nonlinear-polarization-rotation mode-locked Yb-doped fiber laser by using an electronic polarization controller. It is shown to benefit self-starting of mode-locking states, with precise tuning of the spectral profile, pulse width, and carrier-envelope offset frequency. The pulse width changed linearly by 0.78 ps in the time domain, and the carrier-envelope offset frequency shifted similar to 77.5 MHz in the frequency domain with a slight change of the driving voltage of 30.7 mV applied on the controller, corresponding to a polarization rotation of 0.0135 pi. This facilitated precise and automatic regeneration of a particular mode-locking state by setting an accurate voltage at the polarization controller with a programmed microprocessor control unit. (c) 2012 Optical Society of America