High-Conversion-Efficiency and Broadband Tunable Femtosecond Noncollinear Optical Parametric Amplifier

We build a compact high-conversion-efficiency and broadband tunable noncollinear optical parametric amplifier (OPA) in the infra-red (IR) pumped by a femtosecond Ti:sapphire CPA laser. The OPA consists of an internal seed of white-light continuum generator (WLG) and two noncollinear optical parametric amplifiers. The tunable wavelength range is from 1.2 μm to 2.4 μm for both signal and idle pulses. The total OPA efficiency in the last OPA stage reaches about 40% in a wider tunable spectral range (from 1.3 μm to 1.7 μm for signal pulse, from 1.5 μm to 2.0 μm for idle pulse respectively).