RP Fiber Power – Simulations for the Design of Fiber Amplifiers and Fiber Lasers
RP Fiber Power is a powerful software for calculating the distribution of optical powers in fiber amplifiers and fiber lasers. It is thus an invaluable tool for the design of amplifiers and lasers. It has been developed by Dr. Rüdiger Paschotta. User licenses are available both for commercial application in laser companies and for universities and other educational institutions. Contact RP Photonics to enquire about the conditions. However, you don't necessarily need to acquire a software license, as RP Photonics offers to do a wide variety of calculations within consulting contracts, requiring a rather limited amount of time. Note that Dr. Paschotta has a very deep experience with the physics of lasers and amplifiers, related e.g. to spectroscopic properties of doped fiber, saturation characteristics, and the like.
Main Features
- RP Fiber Power calculates the optical powers at different wavelengths within a fiber amplifier or laser. For example, the pump and signal power in an amplifier, as well as power in amplified spontaneous emission (ASE) can be investigated.
- A larger number of wavelength channels can be used, and each one can have different reflectivities on both fiber ends.
- The fiber devices can be core-pumped or cladding-pumped.
- The software can easily import input data (e.g. on laser cross sections or mode profiles) from input files, and export results in exactly the format required by the customer. Input data may be provided by the customer, but some standard data taken from the scientific literature, applicable e.g. to fibers doped with ytterbium and/or erbium, can also be used. It is no problem to model more exotic types of amplifiers or lasers, based e.g. on thulium-doped or praseodymium-doped fibers.
- RP Fiber Power can also simulate the noise performance and quantify it e.g. with a noise figure.
- The software can be used for conveniently investigating the dependence on a large number of parameters, and to automatically optimize parameters according to a freely definable figure of merit.
User licenses are available both for commercial application in laser companies and for universities and other educational institutions. Contact RP Photonics to enquire about the conditions.
Examples of Graphical Output
The following graphs have all been made with RP Fiber Power and illustrate some of its features. They all apply to a core-pumped erbium-doped fiber amplifier with a backward pump at 980 nm and a 1560-nm signal.
The first figure shows the power distributions in the amplifier fiber, including ASE, and also the fractional erbium excitation level.
The next figure shows the spectrum of amplified spontaneous emission (ASE) for both directions. Backward ASE is slightly stronger at short wavelengths; this is due to stronger reabsorption of forward ASE.
Next we consider the saturation characteristics: the amplifier gain is reduced for high input power levels.
Finally, we check the dependence of amplifier output signal power on the fiber length. This shows that the fiber length is not a very critical parameter for the power efficiency.
