The propagation of an intense and short pulse in an optical fiber or waveguide can lead to massive spectral broadening of the initial pulse as a result of cascaded nonlinear light-matter interactions. These effects can be efficiently harnessed and applied to the generation of light source with an ultra-broadband supercontinuum spectrum. Supercontinuum light sources often referred to as white-light lasers have unique properties in terms of brightness, coherence and wavelength coverage.
They have had major impact in many research fields in the past two decades ranging from precision metrology, ultrafast spectroscopy, and the calibration of astro-combs, to high resolution imaging, LIDAR technologies, and the generation of ultrastable microwave signals. Our group has a long history of research into the modelling, development and applications of supercontinuum light sources. Recently, our research have focused onto high-power mid-infrared supercontinuum studies in multimode soft-glass fibers and gradient-index fibers. We are also developing supercontiuum sources for applications in optical imaging, sensing and spectroscopy.
[1] J.M. Dudley, G. Genty, S. Coen, Rev. Mod. Phys. 78(4), 1135-1184 (2006). link
[2] Eslami, Z., Salmela, L., Filipkowski, A. et al. Two octave supercontinuum generation in a non-silica graded-index multimode fiber. Nat Commun 13, 2126 (2022). link
[3] Abba Saleh, Piotr Ryczkowski, Goery Genty, and Juha Toivonen, “Supercontinuum lidar for industrial process analysis,” Opt. Express 29, 42082-42089 (2021) link