Laser stabilization at 1550 nm

We investigate performance and capabilities of laser stabilization for laser sources at a wavelength of 1550 nm for their possible use in future gravitational-wave detectors and look into power scaling in collaboration with the Laser Zentrum Hannover e.V..

The continuous improvement of ground-based gravitational-wave detectors (GWDs) and the preparations for next GWDs place high demands on their stabilized laser sources. The laser source for the GWDs' interferometric measurements has to be single mode, single polarization, single frequency and with low laser noise. The frequency noise and power noise have to be actively and passively stabilized to reach the required stability.

To lower the coating thermal noise, silicon test masses shall be used in future GWDs. A laser source with wavelengths between 1500 nm and 2200 nm can be used with this type of mirror material.

We investigate the performance and the capabilities of laser stabilization methods for laser sources at a wavelength of 1550 nm, which is a wavelength commonly used in telecommunication. Based on these well developed technology we test lasers for their possible use in future GWDs and look into power scaling in collaboration with the Laser Zentrum Hannover e.V..

The free-running noise performance is measured with an in-house build diagnostic breadboard, which was initially developed for 1064 nm wavelength and has been adopted for the use at 1550nm.

By choosing a system with the most complete set of actuators for laser power and frequency, we are building up a pre-stabilized laser system and characterize its performance.

This investigations shall give important information for building high power pre-stabilized laser systems for future GWDs. Additionally they can also be applied to fields of high precision meteorology, coherent beam combination or even for high stable pump sources of 2 µm lasers.

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