Erbium-doped photonic crystal fiber superfluorescent sources in double-pass forward configuration

In order to obtain high-stable erbium-doped fiber source used fiber-optic gyroscope and improve the stability of conventional erbium-doped superfluorescent fiber source, erbium-doped photonic crystal fiber as a superfluorescent fiber source of gain medium was proposed and employed. A superfluorescent fiber source with a double-pass forward configuration was constructed and the output properties of the new fiber source were studied. The influences of fiber length and pump power on output power, spectral width and mean wavelength of fiber source were analyzed. The results show that the superfluorescent fiber source had an output power of 35.4 mW, an optical conversion efficiency of 16.09%, a spectral width of 30.9 nm and a mean wavelength of 1 548.3 nm by choosing the optimized fiber length of 10 m and pump power of 220 mW. This result would set the foundation to further investigate the stability and adaptability of erbium-doped photonic crystal fiber superfluorescent source in the different environment temperatures.