ABSTRACT

The fiber laser, with its humble beginning in the late 1980s, has undergone tremendous development in the past decade or so, transforming itself from a research curiosity to a major force in modern manufacturing. Today, it is revolutionizing our economy by fundamentally changing the way we mark, machine, and process materials on an industrial scale. The recent development of high-power fiber lasers is also fundamentally shaping a wide range of other areas from physical sciences and medicine to geology and space exploration. In the past few years, the tactical deployment of direct energy weapons based on fiber lasers has become a reality.

The development of fiber lasers is rooted in a number of technical areas including optical materials, optical waveguide design, nonlinear optics, optical fiber fabrication, and optical characterization, in addition to optical fiber components, and fiber laser design and architecture. No comprehensive in-depth coverage of such diverse topical areas has appeared in a single book. Many important developments have taken place in the past decade in both academia and industry.

This book comprehensively covers the basics, technology and applications of fiber lasers including up-to-date developments in both academia and industry and is aimed to serve as both an introduction and research aid for graduate students, engineers, and scientists who are new to this field and also for veterans in the field

chapter 1|8 pages

Introduction

chapter 2|16 pages

Optical Fiber Waveguide Physics

chapter 3|36 pages

Nonlinear Effects in Optical Fibers

chapter 4|24 pages

Optical Fibers: Materials and Fabrication

chapter 5|28 pages

Test and Measurement of Fibers

chapter 6|14 pages

Components for Fiber Lasers

chapter 7|26 pages

New and Emerging Fiber Technologies

chapter 8|22 pages

Erbium-Doped Fiber Ampliers

chapter 9|10 pages

CW Fiber Lasers Operating at 1 μm

chapter 11|24 pages

Ultrafast Fiber Lasers

chapter 12|16 pages

Fiber Lasers at ∼1.55 μm

chapter 13|16 pages

Fiber Lasers at ∼2 μm

chapter 14|14 pages

Mid-Infrared Fiber Lasers

chapter 15|18 pages

Supercontinuum Generation in Optical Fibers

chapter 16|6 pages

Industrial Applications of Fiber Lasers

chapter 17|6 pages

Medical Applications of Fiber Lasers

chapter 18|12 pages

Military Applications of Lasers

chapter 19|2 pages

Conclusions