The research activity, characterized by a highly innovative content, concerns the development of novel solid-state oscillators and optical amplifiers with tunable emission from near- to mid-infrared spectral regions for applications to frequency metrology, high-resolution spectroscopy, environmental monitoring, and telecommunications. In particular, on one hand it aims at a deep comprehension of the basic physical phenomena underlying the topics of interest, on the other hand it intends to find new and forefront solutions in the addressed application fields. The laser sources are designed, manufactured and characterized with specific attention to the performance in terms of spectral purity and wide emission bandwidth and operate both in continuous wave regime and in pulsed mode with a pulse duration of a few tens of femtoseconds (passive mode-locking regime).
Main research lines
- Broad tunability bulk and fiber lasers in the 1 – 5 µm spectral region
- Frequency-stabilized laser systems for high-resolution spectroscopy and frequency metrology 1 – 11 µm
- Ultra-fast lasers and synthesis of frequency combs in the 1 – 15 µm and THz spectral region
The above lines are also part of the research activity of the Physics Department of Politecnico di Milano.
Research Projects
- Novel mid-infrared frequency combs for broadband spectroscopy, within the Integrated Infrastructure Initiative in Photonic and Quantum Sciences I-PHOQS
- Development of ultra-fast fiber lasers in the near- and mid-infrared spectral region for vibrational hyper-spectral microscopy, in partnership with Cambridge Raman Imaging (CRI)
- Efficient THz generatIon fOr hypersPectral ImAging and broad-band spectroscopy (ETHIOPIA), Esperimento Gruppo V, Istituto Nazionale di Fisica Nucleare (INFN) in partnership with Physics Department of Università degli Studi di Milano (Prof. S. Cialdi), LASA INFN Milano (Dr. D. Giove), and Physics Department of Università Federico II Napoli (Prof. A. Andreone and Prof. B. Piccirillo)
- Design, realization, and characterization of a 800-m range free-space optical communication link at 10 µm, in partnership with Dipartimento di Elettronica, Informazione e bioingegneria (DEIB) of the Politecnico di Milano (Prof. C. Riva and Prof. L. Luini), Institute of Electronics, Information Engineering and Telecommunication IEIIT-CNR (Dr. R. Nebuloni), and Huawei Italy (Dr. C. Mazzucco and Dr. L. Resteghini)
Main equipments
Optical and electrical spectrum analyzers; Fabry-Perot interferometers; optical autocorrelators; optical wavemeter; energy/power meters; digital oscilloscopes; RF electronic counter and synthesizers; semiconductor pump lasers (from visible to near infrared); single-frequency Non-Planar-Ring-Oscillator (NPRO) Nd:YAG at 1064 nm; 1-kHz linewdth optical standard at 1.5 µm based on frequency-stabilized Er:fiber laser against Ultra-Low-Expansion (ULE) high-finesse resonator; Kerr-lens mode-locked Ti:sapphire laser at 800 nm (250-MHz pulse repetition frequency, 30-fs pulse duration, 0.3-W average output power); SESAM mode-locked Yb:CALGO laser at 1045 nm (160-MHz pulse repetition frequency, 70-fs pulse duration, 70-mW average output power); mode-locked Er:fiber laser at 1550 nm (250-MHz pulse repetition frequency, 70-fs pulse duration, 90-mW average output power.