Fiber laser pumped high average power single-cycle terahertz pulse source

Near single-cycle terahertz pulse generation from lithium niobate crystal by optical rectification of pulses from an Yb:fiber laser/amplifier system was investigated. The pump laser supplied 250 fs duration pulses with 14 mu J energy at up to 1 MHz repetition rate. The terahertz pulse energy and average power exceeded 0.25 nJ and 0.25 mW, respectively. The average power was more than ten times higher than corresponding values achieved by using GaP as the nonlinear crystal under similar pumping conditions. (C) 2008 American Institute of Physics.