Theoretical investigations of broadband mid-infrared optical parametric amplification based on a La3Ga5.5Nb0.5O14 crystal

Recent progress in strong-field physics has stimulated the quest for intense midinfrared ultrashort light sources. Optical parametric amplification (OPA) is one promising method to build up such sources, however, its development significantly relies on the availability of suitable nonlinear crystals. Here, we introduce a positive uniaxial crystal La3Ga5.5Nb0.5O14 (LGN), which exhibits a favorable set of optical properties for the application in a mid-IR OPA. We theoretically evaluate the performance of LGN as the nonlinear crystal of a mid-infrared OPA, with an emphasis on the bandwidth characteristic. We find that this crystal can support broadband amplifications across its entire mid-infrared transparent region up to 6 mu m, outperforming other commonly-used mid-infrared crystals in terms of gain bandwidth. Few-cycle mid-infrared pulses at various wavelengths can be generated from the LGN-based optical parametric chirped-pulse amplifiers. (C) 2016 Optical Society of America