An Er fiber laser generating multi-milliwatt picosecond pulses with ultralow intensity noise

We demonstrate a polarization-maintaining Er fiber laser incorporating a nonlinear amplifying loop mirror (NALM) and a chirped fiber Bragg grating (CFBG) to generate a train of 9.0-ps pulses at a repetition rate of 40 MHz with an average power of ~8 mW. Its intensity noise at 8 MHz is measured to be almost shot-noise-limited, and the corresponding relative intensity noise is as low as −165 dB/Hz.