Towards tapered-fiber-based all-fiberized high power narrow linewidth fiber laser

Yb-doped fiber laser (YDFL) is a promising kind of laser source due to high efficiency, excellent beam quality, robust configuration, diverse applications and so on. The progress of large-mode-area double cladding active fiber and high power laser diodes have been continuously promoting the power scaling of the YDFLs. However, the further power scaling is blocked by some physic issues including nonlinear effect, thermal-induced mode instability (MI), optical damage and so forth. So, newly-designed fibers with special structures are invented to address or relieve these limitations. The tapered fiber, which has changed mode area along its longitudinal direction, has been demonstrated to benefit suppressing the nonlinear effect, especially the stimulated Brillouin scattering (SBS) effect. In this paper, we will review the previous work done to explore the advantages of the tapered fiber for high power output, and then for the first time to our knowledge, demonstrate an all-fiberized high power narrow linewidth fiber laser based on a homemade tapered Yb-doped fiber (T-YDF). As a result, an output power of 260 W with a narrow linewidth of ∼2 GHz is obtained, with SBS effectively suppressed owing to gradually increased mode area of the T-YDF as well as continuously changed Brillouin frequency shift dependent on the core diameter. Further power scaling is limited by MI, and the features of MI are studied in detail. It is pointed out that, the MI seems the primary and durative limitation factor of the tapered fiber amplifier for high power narrow linewidth output due to the gradually increased effective numerical aperture (NA) and the excitation of the high-order modes, even although it has the advantage to reduce other nonlinear effects. At last, worthwhile discussion about the optimization of the T-YDF and the whole fiber laser system for both SBS and MI suppression is conducted based on the previous and our results. It is concluded that the small diameter at the small-diameter end and low optical NA are preferred in the design of a T-YDF to ensure good beam quality and improve the MI threshold. The good splicing quality and proper coiling or bend state are also necessary.