Optik 130 (2017) 1421–1425

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Optik
journal homepage: www.elsevier.de/ijleo

Original research article

Dual-wavelength ytterbium-doped fiber laser using

microfiber and D-shaped polished fiber
M.T. Rahman, F.A. Rashid, H. Ahmad ∗ , Saaidal R. Azzuhri,
M.Z.A. Razak, M.J. Faruki
Photonics Research Centre (PRC), Department of Physics, University of Malaya (UM), 50603, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Article history: This paper describes a dual-wavelength demonstration for a proposed ytterbium-doped
Received 5 February 2016 fiber laser in the 1 ␮m region. A microfiber and a D-shaped fiber, functioning as a wavelength
Accepted 28 November 2016 selective filter, is inserted into the laser ring cavity setup to ensure a stable dual wavelength
operation. The dual-wavelength output from both the microfiber and the D-shaped fiber
Keywords: possess a wavelength spacing of 4.01 and 4.62 nm, respectively. Both the microfiber and
Micro fiber D-shaped fiber use the ytterbium doped fiber as gain medium, and has a stable peak power
Ytterbium-doped fiber laser (YDFL)
and side-mode suppression ratio of more than 30 dB.
Dual-wavelength
© 2016 Published by Elsevier GmbH.
D-shaped fiber
Evanescent field effect

1. Introduction

Generation of a tunable wavelength in ytterbium-doped fiber laser (YDFL), operating in the 1-␮m wavelength region has
attracted considerable interest due to its potential application in spectroscopy, optical coherence tomography and optical
space communication [1]. The advantages of YDFLs include a wide spectral range from 970–1200 nm [2] in comparison to
erbium-doped fibers (EDFs) which work only in the C + L band (1550–1625 nm), as well as have excellent power conversion
efficiency [3,4] and that does not show the excited state absorption phenomenon, which can surely reduce the control of its
pump efficiency [5]. Therefore, the YDFL produces a considerably high output power with a relatively short length of gain
medium.
On the other hand, the development of the dual-wavelength fiber laser (DWFL) has led to advancements in applications of
the microfiber photonic research [6], microwave carriers [7] and high bit-rate pulses [8]. Operation of DWFLs in optical fiber
lasers is highly desirable, and has gained wide attention within optical research communities. However, most of the research
in DWFL was conducted using erbium-doped fiber laser in the 1550 nm wavelength range. Methods such as polarization
hole burning [9], introducing a filter [10], the use of fiber Bragg grating (FBG) [11], and many others has been reported in the
literature for DWFL. However, far less reports can be found for dual wavelength generation using ytterbium-doped fiber as
gain medium, which is the interest of this paper. Most of the proposed methods reported so far for YDFL is in the usage of FBG
as a wavelength selective filter to generate dual-wavelength output [12,13]. Another report suggested the array waveguide
grating (AWG) to produce a constant dual-wavelength output in YDFL [14]. Thus, further investigation of DWFL for a 1 ␮m
source is extremely viable.

∗ Corresponding author.
E-mail address: harith@um.edu.my (H. Ahmad).

http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.ijleo.2016.11.158
0030-4026/© 2016 Published by Elsevier GmbH.
1422 M.T. Rahman et al. / Optik 130 (2017) 1421–1425

Fig. 1. Experimental setup for the fabrication process of microfiber via the flame brushing technique.

Fig. 2. Schematic diagram of D-shaped fiber.

Recent studies on microfibers and D-shaped fibers has found the attractive relationship between the generation of fiber
laser and its strong evanescent field effect. Microfiber has several unique and interesting properties such as high-nonlinearity
and dispersion-tuning ability [15], while D-shaped fiber has been reported as an excellent tunable wavelength converter
with high-nonlinearity characteristic [16,17]. The introduction of microfiber and D-shaped fiber, together with the associated
manipulation of its diameter, length and refractive index contrast, offers the ability to control the multi-modal interference
properties.
This paper presents a demonstration of a simple YDFL with a microfiber and D-shaped fiber that enabled the generation
of a tunable dual-wavelength lasing. Light polarization state was adjusted cautiously and dual wavelength operation was
generated using simple laser ring cavity based on microfiber and D shape. The achieved dual-wavelength output for the
microfiber and D-shaped fiber had a side-mode-suppression ratio (SMSR) of 31 and 32.5 dB respectively. The resulting dual
wavelength was found to be reliable and stable.

2. Experimental arrangement

The microfiber was fabricated using the flame brushing technique shown in Fig. 1. Here, the tapering length of 10 mm
was obtained for the single mode fiber (SMF) during the microfiber fabrication process. The SMF was positioned horizontally
and held tightly by two fix motorized translation stage fiber holders. The linear translation stage has a sliding section in
addition to these two fiber holders. During the tapering process, the motor control board shifts the fiber holder stages to
ensure that the middle range of the clamped fiber was perpendicular and at a constant distance to the torch flame. The torch
is an oxy-butane burner, with a 10 mm long flame, a pinpoint tip and fixed just below the tapered fiber. For optimal flame
performance of the torch, the oxygen gas supply pressure needs to be carefully controlled. The two layers round shaped
oxy-butane burner has a pressure of approximately 5 psi. An appropriate flame level and temperature are vital parameters
to control in order to obtain optimal well-heated tapered fiber [18–20].
The D-shaped fiber used in this experiment was fabricated from a Phoenix Photonics Side Polished Optical Fiber (Model
number SPF-S-SM). The D-shaped fiber was fabricated from a standard SMF (SMF-28) with a core/cladding diameter of
8.2/125 ␮m. Fig. 2 illustrates the side-view of our D-shaped fiber. It has a polished region length of 17 mm and an insertion
loss of ∼0.5 dB. By removing a section of the cladding, the side polishing D-shaped fiber enables access to the evanescent
field of the wave propagating in the standard single mode optical fiber.
The configuration of the proposed DWFL using a microfiber/D shaped fiber is shown in Fig. 3. The ring cavity consists
of a 980 nm central wavelength laser diode with 600 mW output power (Oclaro model LC96A74P-20R) connected to a
980/1060 nm division multiplexing (WDM) which was attached to a gain medium comprising of 70 cm Yytterbium-doped
fiber (YDF) (DF1100 Fiber core,with peak absorption of 1300 dB/m at 977 nm). The YDF was attached to a polarization

Fig. 3. Experimental setup of Dual wavelength YDF laser.

 M.T. Rahman et al. / Optik 130 (2017) 1421–1425 1423

Fig. 4. ASE spectrum of microfiber (blue) and D shaped fiber (red). (For interpretation of the references to colour in this figure legend, the reader is referred
to the web version of this article.)

insensitive isolator to confirm unidirectional propagation of light. A polarization controller (PC) was added in the cavity so
that the light polarization state can be controlled. D-shape/microfiber which is responsible for dual wavelength generation
was kept between the coupler and PC 10% output of the coupler was measured through optical spectrum analyzer (OSA).
Fig. 4 shows the spectrum of the amplified spontaneous emission (ASE) from the microfiber (blue line) and D-shaped
fiber (red line). The aggressive interference pattern, seen clearly from both lines in Fig. 4, was responsible for the lasing in
the proposed system. Lasing within the ring cavity usually occurs at the interference peaks, and simple adjustments to the
polarization using a PC will cause the lasing to shift to another peak, or trigger multi-peak lasing if supported by the cavity.
The core dimensions for both microfiber and D-shaped fiber are very small and can easily be broken even with a small
tension or movement. Therefore, the fiber needed to be carefully packaged and handled, to prevent any damage.

3. Results and discussion

Fig. 5(a) and (b) show the output spectrum of dual wavelength YDFL for the microfiber and D-shaped fiber, respectively.
The laser operates at wavelengths of 1028.10 and 1032.72 nm (microfiber) with peak power of ∼20 dB and at 1042.31 and
1046.32 nm (D-shaped fiber) with peak power of ∼21 dB. The wavelength spacing for both microfiber and D-shaped fiber was
measured as 4.01 nm and 4.62 nm respectively while more than 30 dB of side mode suppression ratio (SMSR) was observed
for each system. The two peaks in Fig. 5 were obtained after the original spectrum, shown previously in Fig. 4, was carefully
amplified using the ring resonator. Within the ring cavity, 10% of the light will be filtered out to the OSA, while the remaining
90% will remain in the loop and amplified by the YDF amplifier again. Therefore, as the interference peaks compete, the one
with the highest intensity will receive the most gain from YDFA and becomes the dominant spectrum in the laser loop ring

Fig. 5. Dual wavelength YDF lasing spectrum using (a) Microfiber and (b) D-shaped fiber.
1424 M.T. Rahman et al. / Optik 130 (2017) 1421–1425

Fig. 6. Microfiber output scan for (a) dual-wavelength stability and (b) peak power stability where ␭1 = 1028.15 nm and ␭2 = 1032.15 nm.

[21]. Without the microfiber or D-shaped fiber as a wavelength selective filter, the YDFL ring will generate an unstable single
wavelength output instead.
The obtained dual-wavelength from both microfiber and D-shaped fiber were stability tested to check the reliability
of our proposed DWFL. Figs. 6 and 7 show the dual-wavelength power stability scan for microfiber and D-shaped fiber,
respectively. The scan was taken for a period of 20 min, with an interval of 2 min between each scan. Fig. 6(a) displays the
stable lasing wavelengths, scanned over the test period and Fig. 6(b) illustrates the power fluctuations during the scan for
microfiber, in which the maximum power fluctuation is less than 2.5 dB. The D-shaped fiber’s wavelengths scan and power
fluctuations during the scan are shown in Fig. 7(a) and (b) respectively, where the maximum power fluctuations are less than

Fig. 7. D-shaped fiber output scan for (a) dual-wavelength stability and (b) peak power output stability where ␭1 = 1042.31 and ␭2 = 1046.24 nm.
 M.T. Rahman et al. / Optik 130 (2017) 1421–1425 1425

2 dB. The power fluctuations in the ring cavity were caused by the fluctuating 980 nm pump power and by the temperature
variation due to power losses in the cavity. Thus the dual-wavelength operation demonstrated here can be considered to
be stable at room temperature. Moreover, limited homogeneous broadening effect was found in YDF causing a stable dual
wavelength.

4. Conclusion

This paper gives a detailed description of a successful demonstration of dual-wavelength fiber lasing via ytterbium-
doped fiber jointly operated with a microfiber and D-shaped fiber. A stable set of dual-wavelength output was obtained,
for which the power fluctuations over a period of 20 min were less than 2.5 dB for the microfiber and 2 dB for the D-shaped
fiber, and the observed SMSR of the proposed experiment was more than 30 dB. The dual-wavelength spacing obtained was
4.01 nm for microfiber and 4.62 nm for the D-shaped fiber. This experiment presents a simple, stable and inexpensive way
of dual-wavelength laser generation and can be used in various optical applications.

Acknowledgement

We would like to thank the University of Malaya for the research funding, under grant numbers RU 007/2015, RP008A-
13AET and RG143-12AET.

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