Coherent octave-spanning mid-infrared supercontinuum generated in As2S3-silica double-nanospike waveguide pumped by femtosecond Cr:ZnS laser

Abstract

A more than 1.5 octave-spanning mid-infrared supercontinuum (1.2 to 3.6 μm) is generated by pumping a As2S3-silica “double-nanospike” waveguide via a femtosecond Cr:ZnS laser at 2.35 μm. The combination of the optimized group velocity dispersion and extremely high nonlinearity provided by the As2S3-silica hybrid waveguide enables a ~100 pJ level pump pulse energy threshold for octave-spanning spectral broadening at a repetition rate of 90 MHz. Numerical simulations show that the generated supercontinuum is highly coherent over the entire spanning wavelength range. The results are important for realization of a high repetition rate octave-spanning frequency comb in the mid-infrared spectral region.